Rock of Gibraltar Defense is Key for Hawk’s, 21-13 Win Over Navarro
QB Jace Wheeler passed for 221 yards in, 21-13 win over Panthers. Go Lake! (photo by Daniel Clifton)
Way to Plug those Leaks Lake!
Canyon Lake’s Defense was a Rock of Gibraltar coming out of halftime and proceeded to allow Navarro one first down and 14 yards which was enough for CL’s Offense to get two scores and a, 21-13 win.
Two Panther completions for 9 yards added to a suffocating Hawk front seven who applied pressure that entire second half.
Navarro possessed the ball 5 times during those last two quarters and the results were stunning on the negative side for the visitors.
Panther’s Second Half: Possession 1: Gained 1 yard on 2 plays and lost fumble. Possession 2: Gained 19 yards on 9 plays and punt. Possession 3: Lost 17 yards on 3 plays and punt. Possession 4: Gained 9 yards on 3 plays and punt. Possession 5: Gained 2 yards on 4 plays and interception.
That would be the ball game with a dominating defense while CL’s Offense came out of their shell after an 141 first half yardage followed wit a total of 250 yards.
Two main offensive weapons had Gram Simpson reached over 100 yards finishing with 117 while Peyton King was targeted 8 times gaining 151 yards which would have been a year’s total during those slot-t campaigns.
QB Jace Wheeler finished with 221 yards passing and now possesses the best win/loss percentage for any Hawk quarter back and 3rd all-time in passing yardage.
TOP 3 QB’s Based on Passing Yardage: Passing Comp Att Pct Yds Int TD Year Finished Ross Wagliardo 308 559 .551 3896 23 28 2009 Brandon Belcher 172 339 .507 3101 10 28 2012 Jace Wheeler 142 235 .604 2609 10 39 Not Yet W L Pct Jace Wheeler 8 5 .615 Ben Fulton 21 15 .583 Hunter Anderson 13 9 .579
King (304 yards) jumped up to 29th on the all-time season receiving yardage and needs 100 more to be in the top 10.
Top 5 Receivers Season All-Time: Receiving Yards Year No Longest TD’s Carter Williams 1189 2024 50 72 19 Eric Nelson 925 2009 62 77 9 Daniel Camarillo 640 2012 29 70 6 Harris Gilliam 603 2023 36 75 8 Eric Nelson 602 2008 35 62 4
Let’s Go Hawks!!
This game had a rough start when Navarro traveled 75 yards to score taking 4 minutes. The Panther’s lead lasted 16 seconds after Peyton King returned the kick-off 40 yards resulting a short field and one play 39 yard strike to (guess who) King.
Coach Darrell Royal once said that two bad things can happen on a pass play. With an obvious interception or a fumble if pass is caught.
The Panthers did the fumble ‘bad thing’ on their next drive but CL would not take advantage reaching the 22 yard line before running out of downs.
Next, Navarro with a 14 play drive but a Hawk defensive stop on the 15 yard line kept this battle tied.
Navarro’s next drive went 11 plays covering 75 yards giving these Panthers a, 13-7 lead that had Isiah Eureste blocked extra point. A key play.
Way to GO LAKE!
The Lake would come out of intermission and ‘repeat’ dominated the last two quarters scoring twice when Wheeler found King on a 42 yard beautiful pass and catch on this one play drive and Hawk, 14-13 lead at the end of that 3rd stanza.
A clinching score starting the 4th quarter was accomplished on a drive that took more than one play when CLake drove 70 yards on 16 plays topped off when Chris Brown used a bruising run for 7 yards and Hawk, 21-13 lead and final score.
Canyon Lake will be back in action when they travel to San Antonio to take on Veterans Memorial at D. W. Rutledge Stadium with kick-off 7:00pm.
A Rock of Gibraltar second half with a chance to improve on that performance against a 5A opponent Veterans Memorial.
Way to GO LAKE!
1 2 3 4 Final Navarro 7 6 0 0 13 CL Hawks 7 0 7 7 21 Scoring Summary: NP-Panther QB 2 yard run (pat good), 8:04, 1st CL-Peyton King 39 yard pass Jace Wheeler (Stracener kick), 7:42, 1st NP-Panther running back 12 yard run (pat blocked), 2:04, 2nd CL-Peyton King 42 yard pass Wheeler (Jack Stracener kick), 1:56, 3rd CL-Chris Brown 7 yard run (Jack Stracener kick), 4:50, 4th Team Stats Panthers Hawks Total Yards 231 391 First Downs 15 18 Rush/Yards 35/103 31/170 Comp/Att/Int 11/21/1 13/21/0 Passing Yards 128 221 Punts/Average 3/35.7 1/38.0 Fumbles/Lost 3/2 3/3 Penalties-Yards 3-30 8-75 Passing Comp Att Pct Yds Int TD Jace Wheeler 13 21 .600 221 0 2 Rushing Att Yds Ave Lg TD Gram Simpson 18 117 6.5 16 0 Chris Brown 6 29 4.8 15 1 Jace Wheeler 4 22 5.5 7 0 Lucas Schexnayder 1 3 3.0 3 0 Kobe Halverson 2 -1 - 3 0 Nico Wyckoff 2 -3 - 3 0 Totals 33 167 5.4 16 1 Receiving No Yds Ave Lg TD Peyton King 8 156 19.5 39 2 Kobe Halverson 3 37 12.3 14 0 Gram Simpson 1 17 17.0 17 0 Lucas Schexnayder 1 11 11.0 11 0 Totals 13 221 17.0 39 2
