BY KERRY BARBOZA Special to the Press
DRIPPING SPRINGS — Taylor gave No. 1 state-ranked Boerne all they could handle during Thursday’s first-round 4A-1 playoff game. Taylor and Boerne battled through wet and windy conditions at Tigers Stadium in Dripping Springs, and the contest was tied at 28-28 late in the third quarter before the Greyhounds pulled away with a pair of rushing touchdowns to secure a 42-28 victory.
The Ducks end their season at 5-6 and Head Coach Earven Flowers said his team played well.
“We fought them and things didn’t fall our way at the end, but I’m proud of the effort,” he said. “We know our team and we knew we could give them problems. Some of their weaknesses were our strengths, but they’re a good team and they found ways. They’re No. 1 for a reason.”
It was a low-scoring first quarter with Boerne leading 7-0, but the second stanza turned into a shootout as the teams tallied three touchdowns apiece.
The Ducks tied it at 7-7 after Josh Mikulencak connected on a 65-yard bomb to Jake Mikulencak early in the second.
The Mikulencak-to-Mikulencak connection worked again as the brothers had a pitch and catch of 39 yards later in the quarter.
Flowers said he felt they could take advantage of Boerne’s defensive alignment and hit some deep passes.
“They’ve been playing man-to-man all year and we tell our guys that if people try to play us that way, we should win some of those 50/50 balls and we did,” he said.
Boerne pulled ahead 28-14 with 38 ticks before halftime, but they left too much time on the clock for Taylor’s high-octane offense.
A good kickoff return gave the Ducks the ball at the Boerne 47. Four plays later, Josh Mikulencak found Treos Richardson in the corner of the end zone on a short pass with one second left.
The Isaac Castro extra point made it 28-21 at the break, but the Ducks remained hot once the second half started and had the first score of the third quarter.
Jackson Meller intercepted a pass at the Boerne 30-yard line. Taylor took advantage of the field position and it was Meller who punched it in on a 6-yard run to knot the game 28-28 with 2:35 left in the third.
Later in the quarter, a strong Boerne punt pinned the Ducks back at their own 1-yard line and that’s when the tide started to change in favor of the Greyhounds.
Taylor only managed five yards on the drive and had to punt from their own end zone.
After the punt, Boerne set up shop at the Taylor 43 and received a steady dose of Hutson Hendrix running the ball out of the Wildcat formation.
Hendrix capped the Greyhounds drive with a short touchdown run and Boerne pulled ahead 35-28 with 8:44 left in the game.
Taylor’s next drive ended with an interception and the Greyhounds once again started a possession in Ducks’ territory, this time at the Taylor 45.
From there, the Greyhounds went on a clock-chewing drive that ate up more than five minutes before ending it with a back-breaking touchdown.
Hendrix ran with the rock before leaving with an injury, but Boerne’s other quarterback, Jaxon Baize, finished it with a seven-yard scramble into the end zone to bump the lead to 42-28 with just two minutes remaining.
“That’s Boerne football, they’re tough and they’re physical,” Flowers said. “They just pounded it, we had to make stops to get them off the field and we just didn’t.”
On its final drive of the season, Taylor moved the ball deep in Boerne territory but couldn’t score before the final buzzer sounded.
