Gallery by Craig Allison
By Tom Bragg, For Lootpress.com
ELKVIEW, W.Va. – In Herbert Hoover’s final season at Joe Eddie Cowley Field last year, the Huskies began 0-2 with losses to Scott and Winfield before going on a memorable run on the road in the Class AA state playoffs en route to the Super Six.
The Huskies repeated last season’s start in 2023, opening 0-2 with losses to Scott and Winfield. It remains to be seen if Hoover can get back to Wheeling, but it took a step back in that direction and opened its shiny, new Husky Stadium in style Friday with a 42-7 win against previously unbeaten Nitro.
“We talked about Monday through Thursday takes care of Friday, and this has been our best week of practice,” Hoover head coach Joey Fields said. “The kids wanted to win. They understood our backs were against the wall. They have been in this position before, and it’s not the ideal plan to be 0-2 and go to a state championship every year, but we’ve got a lot of guys in this locker room that have been in this position before and know how to work hard and handle it.”
Junior quarterback Dane Hatfield led the way for Herbert Hoover (1-2) with four rushing touchdowns against the visiting Wildcats (2-1), but got the scoring started with his arm on his first pass attempt of the game.
The Huskies were backed up near midfield after bad snapped and needed 40 yards to make a first down. Hatfield faked the handoff to sophomore running back Blake Fisher and got the Nitro secondary to bite. That left Avery Pannell wide open for an easy 47-yard touchdown with 1:13 to play in the first quarter.
Nitro answered back with a heavy dose of running back Eli Littlejohn. The junior carried the ball seven times during the Wildcats’ 10-play drive and finished it off with a two-yard touchdown run, which paired with Maddox Cole’s extra point tied the game at 7-7 midway through the second quarter.
Hoover went back to its bread and butter – better known as Hatfield and Fisher – on the following drive. The Huskies pounded their way through a 14-play, 72-yard drive where Hatfield and Fisher accounted for 13 carries and all but three yards with Hatfield diving in from the 1-yard line to finish the drive and put Hoover ahead 14-7 just before the halftime break.
Nitro’s offense has been one of the best in the state through the first two weeks of the season, putting up 56 points in its opener against Poca and then piling on for 84 last week at rival St. Albans. Holding the Wildcats to just seven points in the first half was impressive, but the Huskies took it to another level in the second half.
Herbert Hoover outscored Nitro 28-0 in the final two quarters Friday, and if it could go wrong for the Wildcats in the second half it probably did.
“It was a great plan by our defensive staff, but the biggest thing is we’ve got a good football team. We didn’t play as good those first two games, but if we would have – still, those are two good teams. We think we’ve got a good football team and we believe in our football team. They played hard and they were excited to play.”
No play better encapsulated how bad of a night it was for previously unbeaten Nitro than a kickoff late in the third quarter. Hatfield had just run for his second touchdown of the game to put Hoover ahead 21-7 and the Wildcats needed an answer. Instead, multiple Nitro players appeared to think the kickoff after Hatfield’s touchdown had bounced into the end zone for a touchback, but instead the ball took a hop back toward the field of play and rested on the ground near the feet of the Nitro returners and they didn’t notice.
Hoover hopped on the loose ball and took over possession at the 11-yard line, and two plays later Hatfield ran it in again for a four-yard touchdown to make it 28-7 and effectively end any threat of a Wildcats’ comeback.
“We just fell asleep,” Nitro head coach Boom McKinney said. “Our guys thought it rolled in the end zone and took their eyes off the ball. It was laying right beside them. Again, that’s on us. They didn’t know the ball had to be in the end zone to be dead, and he said he didn’t see it so that’s on me.”
Hatfield added another rushing touchdown and a six-yard passing touchdown to Jaylen Symns in the fourth quarter to set the final score in front of mostly full and very loud Husky Stadium on its debut. The Hoover quarterback finished the game with six total touchdowns, completing 3 of 5 pass attempts for 91 yards and two touchdowns, while also running the ball 22 times for 120 yards and four scores. Fisher didn’t find the end zone but led all players with 134 yards on 20 carries.
“[Fisher] is a great athlete, but there are so many that he missed that we’re going to go back on film [to look at],” Fields said. “That’s a football player. That’s a kid who is a sophomore and right now he’s performing. He’s the punter, he’s the kick returner, he’s at secondary and linebacker. He’s doing it all for us as a sophomore, and he’s the best football player on that team right now.”
For Nitro, Littlejohn ran for 100 yards on 15 carries with one touchdown. Junior quarterback Josh Moody, who came into Friday’s game with 19 passing touchdowns and last week topped former Nitro legend J.R. House’s state record with 11 touchdowns against St. Albans, never got comfortable Friday against the Huskies – he completed just 7 of 12 pass attempts for 47 yards.
“That’s on me,” McKinney said. “We were unorganized tonight and I’ll take all the blame on that one. We’ve got to get better prepared. We didn’t execute. We were in it and we thought we made the proper adjustments, but we didn’t execute. Nothing we did worked.”
The Wildcats return home next week to welcome Cardinal Conference rival Chapmanville to Underwood Field, while Herbert Hoover steps out of Class AA with Class AAA Hedgesville making the long trip from the Eastern Panhandle to visit Husky Stadium next Friday.
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