The Boerne Champion football team closes out the non-district portion of its schedule this week before beginning District 13-5A DI action the following Friday at Smithson Valley.
Champion is on a road trip this Friday to take on Laredo Alexander, 7 p.m.
The Chargers sit at 2-0 after posting a 31-10 win over Laredo United South and a 41-28 victory vs. Medina Valley last Friday.
Champion head coach Blane Ellis said he likes where his team is as they head into their final non-district contest of 2024.
“We hoped to be 2-0 rolling into this week and we are,” he said. “We’re a young team cutting our teeth in the first two games and did a tremendous job, especially last week against a physical team. It was a good test for us.”
This will be Champion’s first road trip of the year and it’s a long one down to the border. Ellis said getting his younger players two home games to start the season should help them going forward.
“I think our first two games at home was good for our guys. This will be their third game but in a different place and they don’t have to try to figure out the speed of the game and all those other things on the road,” he said. “Doing all that on the road is a challenge and we’ve got two games under our belt and have gained experience. We’re going on the road with a lot of confidence.” Ellis said road trips, especially the long ones present challenges for any team.
“It’s a different day, a faster day. The kids get out of school early and get on the bus and go,” he said. “Road trips are good, but it’s good to have an extended road trip like this one. It’ll be good to get a road trip under our belt, especially for our younger guys before we hit district.”
Laredo Alexander is 1-1. They lost to Marshall, 22-13, and beat Gregory- Portland, 23-6. The Bulldogs are coached by Edwin Garcia and he came from Laredo United South, a team the Chargers faced to start the season and have played the last several years, so Ellis said he expects them to look similar to the Panthers. Garcia was the offensive coordinator at Laredo United South before moving to Alexander.
“The coaching bloodline is the same, he was at United South in two of the games when we played them,” Ellis said. “Offensively and defensively, they have similar schemes, they’re just like United South.”
The Chargers are coming off a 41-28 win over Medina Valley. The Panthers gifted Champion two turnovers in the first quarter that helped the Chargers jump out to a 21-0 lead.
Despite five turnovers in the contest, the Panthers made a game of it and were only down by three points late in the third quarter, 31-28.
Champion’s Mark Thompson had a nice kickoff return and took the ball inside Panthers territory just past midfield and the Chargers took advantage right away after Julian Navarrete hit Brogan Dempsey on a 47-yard bomb to make it 38-28.
Garland Whitehead then intercepted a pass on Medina Valley’s next possession and Nathan Bell booted a 29-yard field goal to bump the lead to 41-28.
Cash Hill then intercepted a pass to come up with Champion’s fifth turnover of the game. Maddox Wildey had two fumble recoveries in the game as well.
Ellis said he didn’t like that they let the Panthers back in the game after holding such a big lead.
“The message to our team this week is excellence,” he said. “We need to have a dominating week and when we get up on a team, we need to stay up.”
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