HUTTO – The Stars and Stripes were flying high Friday night in Hutto, as was the local football team, as they defeated the San Marcos Rattlers 66-35 for their first win of the season.
“We played passionate, and we played physical, now we just have to clean up some discipline and detail aspects then the sky is the limit,” Hippos head coach Will Compton said.
The Hutto Hippos dominated in all three phases of the game as they cruised to their first win of the season, but star quarterback Will Hammond stole the show.
After the Hippos opened the scoring on the second play of the game, the Rattlers responded by getting into the end zone after their second play on offense, putting a lot of pressure on the Hippos’ defense.
The Hippos have a lot of new and young faces on their defense, and when they got hit with adversity early on, they responded in a big way. The young players on the Hippos’ defense stepped up and made big-time plays Friday night, which Compton was happy to see.
“I was extremely proud of our defense. We do have a lot of young guys over there that are learning and growing as we are getting through pre-district games,” Compton said. “We are going to have some ups and downs, but I think they did a fantastic job of making adjustments with our coaches, and our coaches did a great job of helping limit some of those big plays San Marcos was having because they have some really good kids over there.”
The Hippos defense shut down the Rattlers’ offense on the next two drives to give the ball to their star quarterback’s hands.
Hammond took full advantage of the extra possessions to help extend the Hippos’ lead to 21-7 early in the first quarter and helped set the tone for the rest of the game.
Hammond would use that comfortable lead to his benefit as he started to open up the passing game in the first half, where he found multiple receivers en route to the blowout victory.
Hammond’s explosive first half showed why Texas Tech is excited to get him on their field. Hammond finished the half with over 300 passing yards, four touchdowns through the air, and one on the ground.
“I thought Will had a great game. We had a great gameplan, and I thought Will did a great job of taking what the defense was giving him and just executing plays,” Compton said.
