Mac dominates Duncan, stays perfect in district

Duncan looked to continue success following last week’s win against Southeast, but MacArthur’s offense was determined to show what it can do with a vaunted attack, winning its second straight game in districts, 64-23.

“I’m happy with our team. They work hard every day and continue to get better,” said Highlander head coach Brett Manning. “We’ve got a big four weeks ahead of us.”

MacArthur made a statement early in the game, scoring in just five plays on its first drive. On third down from the Highlanders’ own 28-yard line, quarterback Aivan Locklin threw the ball to receiver Kenyon Gabrial where the ball slipped through his hands into teammate Boux DeLong’s for a gain of 21 yards. On the very next play, Locklin found DeLong on purpose this time, gaining 38 yards in the process. Following the two big throws, Joziah Thomas carried the ball from the 11-yard line into the end zone for the first score of the night.

Duncan didn’t let the early Highlander success slow it down. Quarterback Sawyer Rice found running back Tavion Holland for an 80-yard touchdown pass with four seconds remaining in the first quarter. With the PAT good, the score going into the second quarter was Mac 15-7.

Duncan recovered their own kickoff on the 33-yard line. On third down at the 17-yard line with less than a minute off the clock in the second quarter. Duncan scored again when Rice found receiver Jackson Poage in the end zone. Duncan tightened the score within one with 11 minutes left in the half.

Mac followed Duncan’s attempt to come back by getting three consecutive touchdowns to end the half, while the Demons only scoring opportunity came when they forced a safety with two and a half minutes remaining. The score at halftime was MacArthur 37-16.

Once the second half rolled around, Mac found its groove. The Highlanders followed a similar plan of using the run game to get most of their yards, and again scored three unanswered touchdowns.

Early in the third quarter, Manning called a timeout and brought the entire team into a huddle. According to him, he pointed out the team’s imperfections and how high the tally of penalties had gotten. MacArthur had more than a dozen penalties and Manning says that if they want to keep seeing success, they need to realize their mistakes.

“I was tired of the silly penalties, all the unforced errors we were making and yards we were giving them off that. I don’t want to play like that, I want to play clean,” said Manning.

It wasn’t until there were nine minutes remaining in the game that Duncan scored its final touchdown of the night. Even then, MacArthur’s second unit responded, with sophomore rushing back Connor Claborn running the ball 24 yards into the end zone with six minutes remaining in the game.

MacArthur’s running game was an important part of their success all night. Marquise Harris had 217 rushing yards, 129 of those coming in the first half, along with three touchdowns. MacArthur on the night had more than 500 rushing yards.

Locklin also had a good night out of the pocket, converting on 7 of his 11 passes on the night, totaling for 184 passing yards. He was also a threat in the running game, with 130 rushing yards, 81 of those yards came from a scoring play halfway through the second quarter for Mac’s last touchdown of the half.

Heading into next week’s matchup against Midwest City, Manning is happy with another win but is making it a point to cut the penalties out.

“We’ve got to cut the penalties out. Our guys play hard, I like where we’re at offensively and defensively,” said Manning. “As a team we just need to clean the penalties up.”