by Richard Williams,
Journal sports writer
The Rutherford Rams and the Liberty County Bulldogs opened with a scoring frenzy early in Friday’s game in Panama City.
Jordan Chaney gave the Bulldogs an early 6-0 lead on an eight yard run. The two-point conversion attempt failed.
The Rams struck back and scored on a 27 yard run to take the 7-6 lead. The Rams took the ball from a Liberty running back and scored on a 75 yard return to make the score 14-6 in favor of Rutherford. The Rams scored again to start the second quarter and were suddenly up 21-6.
Chaney got his second touchdown of the night on the option play and cut the deficit to 21-12, but Liberty couldn’t shut down the Rams and were down 29-12 when they got the ball back.
LCHS quarterback Alex Gonzalez threw to Jarrod Beckwith who scored on the 65 yard pass play, but the Rams countered with a 60 yard run to move to the goal line before scoring from two yards out.
Chaney outraced the defense to score on a 60 yard run that made the score 36-26 in favor of Rutherford at the half.
Rutherford added 13 second half points and Liberty added another touchdown for the final score of 49-32.
LCHS Head Coach Grant Grantham said he thought his offensive line played well, but he said on defense the team continues to make too many mental mistakes.
“We’ve got people that know what to do, but that isn’t always translating over into doing it in the game . . . and that tends to hurt us a lot on defense,” Grantham said.
Liberty travels Friday to take on district foe Franklin County in the first district contest of the year for both teams. Franklin is coming into the game off of two straight wins.
When asked to talk about the upcoming contest Grantham said, “This is a district contest and we better come to play . . . they are 2-1 and we are 1-2 and that says all you need to right now.”