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Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas

Sports

Monday, September 14, 1998

Eagles outlast Bucks, 23-8


By JON FULBRIGHT
Staff Writer
PECOS, Sept. 12 -- It may not have been a perfect reverse
image of their season opening game eight days earlier, but
the second half of their Pecos Eagles' home opener Friday
night against the Alpine Bucks was a lot better for the
Eagles than their opener against Denver City had been.

The Eagles dominated the second quarter of that game, only
to see Denver City run for nearly 200 yards in the second
half and rally for a 20-14 victory. On Friday, Alpine didn't
dominate the second quarter, but they showed more signs of
life than in the opening period, when the Eagles turned a
Bucks' fumble into a 7-0 lead.

However this time, it was Pecos that turned on the ground
game in the second half, rushing for over 200 yards in the
final two periods, and scoring 16 fourth quarter points on
the way to a 23-8 victory.

"We played the option a whole lot better this week," said
Eagles' coach Dan Swaim, who got his first head coaching
victory on Friday. "I'll have to look at the film, but
(linebacker) Joe Robert Lara played well, and Trent Riley
and Daniel Terrazas did too, at linebacker. We had those two
sophomores starting for us and they did an outstanding job.

"We also got good play out of our corners, Joseph Torres and
Hector Garcia," said Swaim, whose team held Alpine to just
107 yards rushing until the final 90 seconds of play, when
quarterback Justin Yarborough broke free for an 80 yard
touchdown run that spoiled the Eagles' shutout.

Mark Abila had run 31 yards through the middle two plays
earlier for Pecos' final score, capping a 16-point outburst
in an eight-minute span that broke the game open. Alonzo
Valencia had given the Eagles some breathing room with 9:06
to play, when he hit a 26-yard field goal to put Pecos up
10-0, and the Eagles then went on a 55-yard drive on their
next possession, capping it with Jacob Esparza's two-yard TD
run at the 2:50 mark.

A high extra point snap kept Alpine within two touchdowns
and a pair of two-point conversions of a tie, but four plays
after the kickoff a bad pitchout by Yarborough was recovered
by Esparza, and Abila went the distance for his first TD of
the season on the next play.

Esparza had a `noisy' 51 yard rushing night, while Lucio
Florez collected a `quiet' 112 yards, 47 of that on a third
period run that set Pecos up deep in Alpine territory. The
drive stalled out went Oscar Luna's fourth down pass was
picked off by Yarborough inside the Bucks' 10, but Alpine
was never able to mount a successful drive after that until
the game was decided.

Esparza had three runs in which he bounced off tacklers to
gain extra yardage, with the most impressive being the one
that didn't count, one play after Florez' long dash. The
junior was stopped four yards behind the line of scrimmage,
but broke six tackles and went down the sideline 27 yards
for a touchdown. However, five of the broken tackles came
after a 15-yard penalty flag for an illegal block had been
thrown, and Yarborough's interception then ended the series.

"Jacob ran real hard for us and Mark did a good job too,"
said Swaim about Abila, who finished up with 96 yards on the
ground.

Manuel Contreras started and finished Pecos' first scoring
drive in the opening period. The senior recovered a fumbled
pitch out by Cody Carpenter at the Bucks' 37 and then on
4th-and-goal at the 11, Luna found Contreras across the
middle for a touchdown, the third in two years for the
Eagles' tight end against the Bucks.

Pecos had to overcome two procedure calls to score on that
series, as penalties hurt the Eagles against the Bucks for
the second year in a row. THey had eight on Friday, while
Alpine didn't have any after three first quarter flags.

The Eagles ended up with an even 300 yards on 50 carries,
out of 324 total yards. They had 25 carries in both halves,
but gained 210 more yards in the final two periods than in
the opening quarters.

"I think we came out in the second half with a fire and
intensity we didn't come out with against Denver City,"
Swaim said. "We finally put a complete game together
tonight. Offensively, defensive, this is the first complete
game we've played in a while."

The win snapped Pecos' six-game losing streak, dating back
to the middle of the 1997 season. One of those loses was a
season-ending 49-6 pounding a year ago by Fort Stockton,
who'll be in Pecos this Friday. The Panthers, who were
picked third in the Eagles' former district this season, are
looking to recover from a 34-14 opening loss at Crane and a
42-7 defeat at home on Friday to El Paso Riverside.

Riverside had routed the Eagles' new district rival,
Canutillo, 56-14, in their opener, and on Friday, Canutillo
was edged by Class 5A El Paso Jefferson, 28-24. In other
District 2-4A games, Fabens and Mountain View improved to
2-0, Fabens by a 31-8 score over El Paso Cathedral and
Mountain View by 23-22 over El Paso Parkland. Clint slipped
to 1-1 with a 21-18 loss to El Paso High and San Elizario
fell to 0-3, as El Paso Americus got their first-ever
varsity win, by a 30-8 final score.

Pecos girls sweep Central, Greenwood


PECOS, Sept. 14 -- Up until Saturday afternoon, the Pecos
Eagles have had trouble stringing together more than one or
two good games of volleyball at a time in a single day.

But on Saturday, the Eagles put together four good games
out of five, and that produced a pair of victories over the
San Angelo Central Bobcats and the Greenwood Rangerettes.

Playing at Midland Greenwood, the Eagles swept Central,
15-6, 15-13, then won two close 15-12, 15-13 matches against
the Rangerettes on either side of their only loss, by a 15-1
score.

"They surprised me," said Eagles' coach Becky Granado. "In
the second game against San Angelo Central it went back and
forth, back and forth, but they hung in there and never
stopped fighting, and that was a good sign. That's the first
time I've seen them play like that."

"The third game against Greenwood was the same way. They
took the lead, then we came back, and then they would go
back in front again," she said. "In the end Shaye (Lara)
came in and served an ace and they made a hitting error, and
that's what gave us our 15th point."

Overall, Granado said serves were still a problem for
Pecos, though she added that junior Katrina Quiroz did a
good job in her first action after missing the first 3½
weeks of play with an injury.

"She came in to serve for Sherrie (Mosby) and came up with
four straight aces against Central," said Granado.
"Serving's still a problem. Against Central, we missed three
game points."

She also said the Eagles "just stood around," in their lone
loss. "We just couldn't do anything right in that second
game." But overall against the Rangerettes, Granado said
Pecos played well.

"We played good defense. Sherrie and Philonicus (Fobbs)
were really getting up there. Philly had a bunch of tipped
balls and that helped our back line," Granado said. "Another
thing that helped is our outside hitter are starting to come
through. They're not hitting the ball hard, but they're
finding the holes.

"We also did better in our communication, and our setters
are starting to move the ball around. They had a double-team
on Sherrie and Philonicus and they moved the ball to the
outside hitters, which is good," the Eagles' coach added.

Pecos improved its record to 7-8 on the season going into
their final pre-district matches, at home on Tuesday against
the Monahans Loboettes and Presidio Blue Devils. The
Loboettes split their matches on Saturday, losing at home to
Alpine while beating Water Valley, while Presidio lost to
Crane and Grandfalls at the Andrews Tournament.

Pecos' freshmen split their matches against Greenwood, as
the purple team won while the gold team lost, and the
Eagles' junior varsity finished fourth in the JV division of
the Andrews Tournament. Scores were not available for the
sub-varsity matches.

Denver wins, Elway down, Aikman out


By JOHN MOSSMAN
AP Sports Writer
DENVER, Sept. 14 -- In a battle of heavyweight quarterbacks
who have combined to pound out four Super Bowl titles,
neither Dallas' Troy Aikman nor Denver's John Elway was
standing at the finish. But Terrell Davis was.

Aikman was lost for 4 to 8 weeks with a broken left
collarbone suffered in the second quarter, and Elway went to
the sideline in the fourth quarter with a strained right
hamstring of undetermined severity.

Davis, meanwhile, ran for 191 yards and three touchdowns,
helping the Denver Broncos rout the Dallas Cowboys 42-23 on
Sunday.

``The offensive line gave me some creases,'' said Davis, who
had back-to-back touchdown runs of 63 and 59 yards in the
first quarter. ``The O-line got on the defensive linemen and
the linebackers and left me one-on-one with some safeties
and cornerbacks. I know I'm not going to run like this every
week.''

With the score tied 7-7, Davis went up the middle, bounced
outside and, untouched, outran three defenders down the left
sideline for 63 yards.

The next time he touched the ball, Davis started left, cut
back and dashed 59 yards for a 21-7 lead late in the first
quarter.

Davis carried six times for 138 yards in the first period
alone. He added a 3-yard scoring run in the fourth quarter.

Asked his impression of Davis, Dallas cornerback Deion
Sanders said, ``Wonderful, man. Being out there on the same
field is such a treat. I wish I wouldn't have watched him so
much and tried to catch him.''

Broncos fullback Howard Griffith said ``every time he
touches the ball, he has an opportunity to score. There are
so many ways for this team to score anyway.''

Elway, for example. Before his injury, Elway completed 16 of
22 passes for 268 yards and two touchdowns and ran for
another score.

The Broncos, who finished with 515 total yards, scored
touchdowns on their first five possessions to take a 35-17
lead at halftime. Elway completed 11 of 13 passes for 217
yards in the half, and Denver generated 379 total yards in
the half compared to Dallas' 209.

``I don't know if I've ever seen a team go five series and
get five touchdowns in the first half,'' Broncos coach Mike
Shanahan. ``It doesn't get much better than that.''

Added Elway, ``That's the best half I've ever been involved
with.''

The 35 points were the most ever surrendered by Dallas in
the first half.

Cowboys defensive back Darren Woodson said the Broncos had a
good offensive scheme that caught the Cowboys by surprise.

``They came up with a different game plan than we thought
they'd have. We had to cover different guys. We just didn't
match up. We had some linebackers on tight ends and
linebackers on runningbacks and corners on runningbacks. We
made the adjustments at halftime and played a lot better in
the second half,'' Woodson said.

Dallas first-year head coach Chan Gailey said the Broncos
``did a great job of spreading us out and creating a lot of
one-on-one matchups. We allowed them to break two long runs.
Long runs are what will get you.''

After Dallas (1-1) closed to 35-23 on two field goals by
Richie Cunningham, the Broncos fashioned their fifth scoring
drive of at least 80 yards, capped by Davis' third score.

Elway departed after straining his hamstring on a handoff
during the drive, and backup Bubby Brister passed 38 yards
to Ed McCaffrey to set up the score.

As for his injury, Elway said, ``The hamstring popped on me.
I'll just have to wait and see. I've always been a fast
healer.''

Jason Garrett played well in Aikman's absence, but on all
three of his scoring drives, the Cowboys had to settle for
field goals.

The Cowboys lost Aikman midway through the second quarter
when he scrambled for a 6-yard gain and was hit by two
defenders.

``I landed on the shoulder,'' Aikman said. ``I got hit after
I was on the ground, but I don't think that was so much it
as much as it was just the awkwardness in which I fell on
the shoulder.''

Referring to Aikman's injury, Gailey said, ``I hate to use
the word `devastating.' I would say it hurts our football
team. He's an all-time great player, and you don't lose
all-time great players and have it not affect your team. At
the same time, we've got to go on. They're not going to
cancel the games because we have an injury.''

Dallas' Emmitt Smith rushed for 93 yards and a touchdown and
increased his career total to 11,451 yards, moving past
Buffalo's Thurman Thomas into eighth place in NFL history.
Thomas has 11,405.



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Pecos Enterprise
Mac McKinnon, Publisher
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324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net

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Copyright 1998 by Pecos Enterprise