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Williamstown looks to avoid 4-game losing skid

JORDAN HOLLAND The Marietta Times Williamstown’s Carter Haynes (3) fakes a handoff to Donathan Taylor during a high school football game against Marietta earlier this season.

WILLIAMSTOWN — No current Williamstown football player had even been born the last time the Yellowjackets suffered through a four-game losing streak.

In fact, the last time Williamstown had a three-game skid was all the way back in 1999 when then head coach Bernie Buttrey’s squad tasted tough consecutive setbacks to St. Marys (20-16), Doddridge County (18-14) and the Lumberjacks from Valley (27-21) during a 5-5 campaign.

Starting at 7 p.m. Friday, WHS head coach Terry Smith’s 1-3 squad will try to snap out of a three-game funk when Ravenswood (2-1) rolls into town for the Yellowjackets’ homecoming.

“Williamstown is probably the best 1-3 team in single-A,” stated Ravenswood defensive coordinator Jason Jackson, who knows the ‘Jackets have plenty of ways to beat a team aside from signal-caller Carter Haynes and tailback Donathan Taylor. “In 2014, we were relieved when we thought we had seen the last of a great rushing quarterback when Dakota Watson graduated.

“Then Trenton Tallman showed up. Now, it’s the same thing all over again. Tallman graduated but Carter Haynes shows up. Haynes runs their offense as well as those guys did and that is tough to prepare for. Taylor is a good running back that sees the field well and when you have that combination of two guys that do their jobs well in the spread, it’s tough to defend.”

Ravenswood head coach Kemp Kelly’s program easily could’ve been 3-0 heading into this tilt if not for a disastrous performance against Webster County. The Red Devils bounced back last week with a solid 26-12 road win at Tyler Consolidated, which fell 54-33 in the season opener to Williamstown.

In last week’s game, senior tailback Jayden Rhodes rushed for 222 yards and had a pair of touchdowns. He also had an interception and completed a pass to quarterback Stephen Dawson. Max Hilton and Luke Jackson registered a dozen tackles apiece as the Red Devil defense limited TCHS to less than 100 yards rushing.

“We thought we played a pretty good second half,” Smith said of last week’s 28-23 setback at Wheeling Central. “We played pretty well, but you know, we’re 1-3 which isn’t real good. The kids are trying. The effort is there and hopefully we are going to get a little better.

“He (Rhodes) looks really good and the quarterback looks good. They beat Tyler and Tyler gave us all we could handle for a while. I think they look pretty good on film. They are certainly a little bit bigger than us, but most teams are.”:

Continuing on the loss to the Maroon Knights, Smith added “I think we just got down and they are so good. We gave up 28 points in the first half. You can’t make any mistakes at all.

“We had a couple holding penalties and you do one little thing wrong they are going to capitalize and make it tough on you. It’s like we got to play a perfect game.”

Haynes leads the WHS defense in both interceptions and fumble recoveries with two apiece. Evan Amos and Bradan Mullenix each have made 38 total tackles.

“Practices have been going good. I don’t have any complaints,” Smith added. “I think the effort is there, but we aren’t doing everything right. The effort is there and I like that.”

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