Kegan Bates (4) of the Labette County Grizzlies rushes through the pile for a touchdown during Friday night’s homecoming victory over the Fort Scott Tigers in Altamont at Labette County High School.
ALTAMONT — Bouncing back from their first loss of the season, the Labette County Grizzlies flew by the Fort Scott Tigers, 28-7, on Friday night in Week 5 SEK League action.
“We had a really good first half and a good first five minutes of the game,” Labette County head coach Bradley Argabright said. “We scored quickly. We got in a bit of a lull, but I’m proud of the guys. We got a lot of good experience. And I’m proud of our defense. They only had one bad drive. They limited Fort Scott’s rushing yards and what they wanted to do.”
Deontae Fields racked up 129 yards on the ground, including a 75-yard run to the house late in the first half.
“He’s becoming a really good football player for us,” Argabright said. “He had some explosive plays. He’s hitting the hole hard. We also got him involved in the passing game. He’s tough to tackle in space. We’ll keep leaning on him.”
Aaron Wyrick was 7-of-12 passing for 61 yards with a touchdown and an interception.
“We’re pretty content with where we’re at,” Argabright said. “We want to run the ball for three-to-four yards per carry and move the chains. 12to015 passes a game for us is fine. We know we can throw it. It’s a week-to-week thing where we’ll take what the defense gives us. Our No. 1 concern is taking care of the ball. We had an interception, but we had four takeaways and never put the ball on the ground. We’re playing good, complementary football right now.”
Labette County improved to 4-1 overall, quickly burying the memory of its first loss of the year to Wellington in Week 4.
“We’re playing good football, but we still haven’t put a full game together,” Argabright said. “We want to start that in October. We know there’s expectations right now. Our staff is preaching that we have to respect our opponents. We’ve been on the other side of this. So we want to give everybody our best shot.”
Up next
Labette County heads west to Coffeyville in Week 6.
“We want to stay healthy, especially in October,” Argabright said. “We want to take care of the little things and get better in practice. We’ll show up and give our best effort for 48 minutes. It doesn’t matter who our opponent is. Hopefully, we get out injury free and play a good game.”
