Everything went just about as well it could for the Chandler Lions Friday night against Tulsa Webster.
They scored on a kickoff return, a safety, a strip-andscore and had three one-play scoring drives. And they led 41-0 after a quarter and 69-0 at the half.
The end result was a 69-16 win that evened the Lions’s season record at 3-3 and left them 2-1 in District 2A-4. This week, the Lions go to Westville, in the foothills of the Ozarks just this side of the Arkansas state line. The Yellowjackets are 1-5 on the season and 0-3 in district play.
“Going into it, we thought we were the better team and we knew we needed to start fast on them,” head coach Jack Gray said of the win over Webster. “A big challenge was going to be how fast we started right off the bat. We did a real good job of it. Things started a little quicker than I thought we would.
“We ran the ball real well and fixed some of the things from the previous week.”
Ty Garver started the scoring fest when he ran in a 23-yard touchdown with just over four minutes gone in the game.
Bryson Taylor intercepted a pass on the Warriors’ next possession and Javarious Wade took the first snap to the house on a 57-yard run featuring some anklesnapping cutbacks, and the Lions were up, 13-0, with just more than six minutes left in the first quarter.
Garver scored again on an 11-yard run and Grant McGinnis ran for a seven-yard score, making it 25-0 with 2:36 left in the first quarter.
Garver scored again on a 52-yard pass from Cruz Jackson, Chace Buchanon racked up a safety and then Darius Wade returned the kickoff after the safety for a touchdown.
It was 41-0 after the first quarter. Chandler scored again on an 8-yard run by McGinnis, a 7-yard run by Garver, the strip-and-score by Tillis and led, 69-0 at the half.
This week the Lions go to Westville, in the foothill “A lot of time in games like this, you can ride yourself down and not be up for it as much as last week going against Metro,” Gray said. “It was good to come out fast.
One of the highlights was Tillis yanking the ball away from a Webster carrying and motoring to the end zone. He was injured in the season opener against Stroud.
“It was his first week back, Gray said. “We haven’t had him since Week 1. It was good to see Travian running around good.”
Against Westville, the Lions have a chance to snap their loss-win-loss-win-loss-win cycle for the season and put a headlock on the No. 2 position in the district. One of the challenges will be a long bus ride, a Thursday game and a disruption to their usual routine.
“Three hours and 20 minutes on the bus,” Gray said. “It’s just a change of schedule, getting out of school early and it being fall break. That’s always kind of a sideshow itself.
“This is a team we can go and have a big win against, if we show up and play fast.
“We try to keep everything as normal as we can, but a three-hour bus ride is kind of a big deal, but we hope to get there early and get moving around.”