Looking backward then forward: A retrospective look at right now! @CentreFootball @minguabeefjerky @PrepSpin @MaxPreps

This is the last installment of this series until the Colonels open in its brand new stadium to kick off the ’22 football season. In this article we will look back at a huge win over Berry College, a team coming off of five (5) consecutive SAA crowns and one we hadn’t beaten in a while.

Yesterday, the Centre Colonels jumped on the Vikings in Valhalla and essentially had the game in the bag by halftime, leading 35-0 at the break. Berry College “slapped some lipstick on the hog” with 27-second half points but Centre would come away from Mount Berry, Georgia with an impressive victory and optimism abound concerning the future of the football program.

Looking back at Berry College…

Centre College dominated this contest statistically as well as on the final scoreboard. Centre had 31 first downs to Berry’s 19. Centre was 44% (4 of 9) on 3rd down and 75% (3 of 4) on 4th-down. 

Centre rang up 518-yards of total offense (226 passing/ 292-rushing) to 316 for Berry (211/105). Centre averaged 8.1 yards per passing play and 5.6 yards per carry.

Individually, Trentin “Supper” Dupper got right back on the preverbal horse. He was 18 for 27 through the air for 215-yards passing with 2TDs against the one pick.

OL had to perform very well looking at the rushing numbers

Rushing, Dupper carried it 19-times for 130-yards with 3-rushing TDs. He was not the leading rusher however. That distinction belonged to Patric Edwards. Edwards carried the football 22-times for 148-yards with a pair of rushing TDs

Jordan Gunter closed out his fine career in the “gold and white” with 4-receptions for 55-yards. Christian Billiter had 3 catches for 44-yards and Cort Marbaugh and Daylin Huff caught the pair of TDs thrown on the day. 

Freshman Cam Tegge was 7 for 7 on PATs. Christian Billiter had 81-yards in returns including a 52-yard kick return many believed he was on his way to housing. 

Defensively, Armon Wells had an “Armon Wells” type day. Wells led the defense with 8-tackles including both a QB-sack and a TFL. Ollie Hunter had a half a sack he split with Kaden Gervacio and a TFL. Gervacio also had a TFL. 

Dallas Douglass and Jack McDowell split the remaining QB-sack. Logan Wolf had the defense’s only pass breakup on the day.

Looking Forward to the ’22 season…

There are some key contributors from off the ’21 team contemplating a 5th-year. Some of the guys we celebrated as “Seniors” this year will get celebrated a second year and that is cause for us all to celebrate.

If this season showed Centre anything at all, it should have shown the Colonel program and faithful just how close we are, talent-wise, to being capable of competing at the very top of the NCAA, Division 3 level. We were in the conference and/or “at large” hunt all season. We were in, out, and around the top-25 for parts of the season.

When we got off the bus ready to play in ’21; we were as good as any team in the conference. When we got off the bus appearing as though our heads were elsewhere we were also a team which could make a game of any rout.

We have to work on making our performances more consistent. We were a team who was very good when we were good and not so good when lackadaisical. We need to be consistently, week after week, good; and then we will be great!

We really can’t name them all, we wouldn’t want to omit anyone, but we have some young talent on this team who will blossom into difference makers next year to go along with returning talent at key posts. Centre, like Centre always does, is recruiting really well. We are looking likely to land a few first year players who may arrive pushing to get on the field.

Prognosis;

Over all, Centre finished the year 8-2, opening and closing with 4-straight wins sandwiched around two tough losses to Trinity and Birmingham Southern in between. Trinity College earns the SAA’s automatic playoff bid by virtue of winning the conference and many prognosticators have forecast Birmingham-Souther will get in the playoffs via an “at-large” bid. Getting two teams in speaks to the strength of the conference and means there was a very thin margin between Centre and going to the playoffs this year, that margin being letting BSU off the hook earlier in the year. 

Still, 8-2 is fine work. It is something very positive on which to build. 

Thank you for reading us this season. We hope to be back in this same capacity a year from now. 

This is Coach HB Lyon, reporting for KPGFootball, and we’re JUST CALLING IT LIKE WE SEE IT!

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About Henry Lyon 1210 Articles
Have coached at the high school and middle school level. Have worked in athletic administration. Conceal my identity to enable my candor on articles published by this magazine. Only members of the editorial board are aware of my true identity.

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