Heading into Friday night’s game between the Jayton Jaybirds and the visiting Spur Bulldogs, the community hype was certainly set. The game saw Spur take a 24-0 lead into the half. The Jaybirds would rally and play much tougher football in the second half, pulling to within 8 at one point, but ultimately would fall to the Bulldogs 62–34. In the end, despite the effort, the Jaybirds had no answer for Spur’s senior running back Cory Hamilton, who toted the rock over 350 yards and accounted for 8 touchdowns.
“We started the game off pretty rough, really the whole first half, we just couldn’t seem to get out of our way,” said Jaybirds head coach Josh Stanaland. “We’re not ever going to make excuses, but we are not senior-heavy right now and there were some times tonight were we looked a little young. I think we fumbled 4 times in the first half and did some things that were a little bit uncharacteristic of us. When we beat ourselves it makes it really hard, especially when you’re playing someone as good as they are.”
It wasn’t all negative for the Jaybirds. Jayton did have some bright spots, such as freshman Colt Gentry’s 30-yard pick-six, or freshman Bode Ham’s 38yard touchdown run, or senior Jaydon Rivera’s 2 touchdown catches.
“I’m proud of how our guys came out in the second half and really answered. That speaks a lot to their competitiveness and their maturity. They came out and they battled and we came up short, and that’s part of it.” Stanaland added.
TheSpurgamealsomarked the end of the pre-season for Jayton. Stanaland noted, “We achieved one thing we wanted to achieve tonight, we got out healthy. We’re ready for district. We played a super tough schedule on purpose. There’s zero doubt in my mind that we’re prepared for district… we’re going to be ready to go next week.”
The games that count begin this Friday in Aspermont.
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