The Mason County Royals hosted the Harrison County Thoroughbreds on the football field this past Friday.
In the Royals second district game of the season, Mason County took on the ‘Breds Friday night looking to advance their season record to 6-1, and go 2-0 against district opponents following their 60-0 victory over the Holmes Bulldogs last week.
The Royals came out of the gate strong, with their defense able to easily fend off Harrison County throughout the first quarter. Mason County’s first touchdown of the night came soon after, with a successful PAT attempt pushing the Royals over Harrison County 7-0 30 seconds into the second quarter. As the first half continued, Mason County would work past the ‘Breds defense, bring in the ball into the end-zone two more times to lead 21-0 over Harrison County heading into halftime.
“Thought we were really sloppy to be honest. Just kinda missing and things we normally do that we execute at a higher level, and I didn’t feel like we executed very well tonight. I think fall break and being out of routine, and showing up and kids being sick, and we got dinged up there early and held some kids out there. Mark of a good team, you still execute and do what you need to do, so, we did that and excited to get back to a normal routine next week.” said Royals head coach, Joe Wynn.
Throughout the second half, Mason County would score two more touchdowns, with their first of the half coming late in the third quarter bringing their lead to 28-0 over the Thoroughbreds. A huge interception by Hayden Horn shortly after would then allow the Royals to score again, now leading 35-0 with a running clock heading into the fourth and final quarter of play.
While Mason County’s offense gradually furthered the Royals’ lead over Harrison County, the defense continued to hold off the ‘Breds throughout the entirety of the contest. By the end of the game, Harrison County totaled 24 passing yards and 44 rushing yards, picking up 68 yards total, thanks to Mason County’s incredibly tough defense.
“Our defense is outstanding. Bend a little bit in the first half, but don’t break. That’s the mark of a good team and our defense has done that week in and week out for I feel like the past four years. A team we can lean on and make sure that we play good football back and forth together there so, we execute at a high level there and as long as we keep doing that we’re gonna find ourselves in every football game.” said coach Wynn.
With this win behind them, Mason County now sits at 6-1 on the season, with a contest against fellow district opponents, the Grant County Braves coming up this Thursday, October 17 now their primary focus.
“Grant’s the biggest game of the year for us. If we beat them we’re 3-0 in the district, guarantee ourselves a home playoff game, and then go into Cov-Cath for a district championship and that will be four years in a row we’ll be playing for a district championship. We mark down goals every year, and the first one is to beat Fleming, win a district championship and then host a home playoff game. Two of the three can be done this week on Thursday night if we beat Grant and then we hopefully go to Cov-Cath for a district championship.” said coach Wynn.
Following their contest with the Braves, the Royals will then head to Park Hills to take on the Cov-Cath Colonels in their last district match-up of the season, before returning home to Maysville on November 1 to host the Lawrence County Bulldogs in the last regular season game of the year.
“Hopefully we get healthy pretty quick, we got some guys dinged up tonight, but next man up and our guys are executing at a high level. It’s hard to come in week in and week out and execute at a high level and not take a blunder there but, we gotta be smart with how we take care of our bodies. Keep working and executing at a high level and taking care of what we need to take care of, that’s us and if we do that we’ll be okay.” said coach Wynn.