Calhoun Runs Past Stafford
Stewart 5 TDs; Combines with Johnson for 362 Rushing Yards
STAFFORD – For three seasons, Calhoun’s potent Flexbone option attack has started with two-time first-team all-state fullback Steve Johnson.
The leading rusher in school history got his yards Friday night – 213 on 20 carries to be precise – but senior quarterback Jarius Stewart was the touchdown maker. He scored five times as the Sandcrabs blitzed Stafford 40-14 at Spartan Stadium.
Stewart reached the end zone on runs of 1, 45, 5, 61 and 19 yards en route to a career-best 149 on 16 attempts. Johnson’s late 41-yard TD run was icing on the cake, but enabled the senior to post his 13th 200+ rushing performance.
“Tonight, my line blocked well,” Stewart said. “When I made the right reads, it just opened up some holes for me.”
And Johnson, as well.
“Our inside veer,” coach Richard Whitaker said when asked about the key to Calhoun’s attack. “We ran some unbalanced (line) on these guys tonight and I thought the inside veer was well, the quarterback did a good job of reading. They (defenders) make decisions, they got to take the dive, the quarterback, and the pitch and a lot of their decisions tonight were not to take the quarterback. We were able with the unbalanced to get a hat on an extra guy there and that allowed Jarius to have some good runs.”
Calhoun’s average field position in the first half was the Sandcrab 41. After an illegal shift on first down set the visitors at Stafford’s 37, Stewart engineered an 11-play, 63-yard scoring march for the first points. Johnson accounted for 37 yards during the drive.
Calhoun’s second possession began and ended on the same play, a 45-yard Stewart burst for six. The second of three Jose Ledezma conversions extended the lead to 14-0 with 2:30 left in the first quarter.
The fourth Sandcrab series began with a false start and spot at the Spartan 28, but Johnson runs of 13 and 21 yards sandwiched slotback Min Htway’s 33-yard dash down the right sideline. At the 5, Stewart kept off the left side to pay dirt.
Stafford answered, its six-snap, 72-yard push for points successful when Kaleb Roberts found a wide-open Jordan Barrett from 35 out. Christian Fregia did the heavy lifting for Stafford’s ground game, picking up 30 yards along the way. Any Spartan momentum, however, quickly evaporated over just two plays as Johnson rambled for seven and Stewart again outran everyone for 61 and six more points 2:41 before halftime.
Johnson’s fumble after a 31-yard run on the first play of the third quarter temporarily delayed a four-score lead, but Stewart traveled 19 yards to visit the end zone a fifth time and put Calhoun up 33-6 at the 6:35 mark of the third quarter.
Whitaker, whose eighth-ranked squad faces sixth-ranked El Campo at home next week, will have some points of emphasis in practice. The Sandcrabs were flagged for an illegal shift and two false starts. Each call came on the first play of a series. They also fumbled twice.
“Well, we’re just sloppy with the offsides penalties and things like that,” Whitaker said. “We started first-and-15 about four times. Those are the kinds of things you can’t do and beat a team like El Campo. And again, we turned the ball over, the fumble in the third quarter there. Steve made a good run, but you got to put the ball away. That’s something we harped on all week long and just got to continue to do it and hopefully we’ll continue to get better at it.”
The good news: Stewart has obviously settled in under center and an offensive line with five new faces cleared the way for 432 yards Friday. And Cory McFall’s defense, the front seven of which Whitaker characterized as “scrappy,” limited Stafford to 254 yards, 102 rushing.
Only 56 miles separate the campuses of El Campo and Calhoun. Next Friday we’ll find out how close the teams really are.