Rebels notch 1st win of Calhoun era
NORTHPORT -- A near 90-minute weather delay did not stall the Vestavia Hills High School football team Friday night, as the Rebels poured out 50 points in a 50-0 win to spoil Tuscaloosa County’s homecoming. It is the first win of Sean Calhoun’s tenure as Vestavia’s head coach.
“I’m just happy for these kids and how much they’ve been battling. The boo birds started coming out, ‘you’re not very good,’ and this and that. You’ve got to block out the outside world and focus on our team and our program. It’s a great group of kids and I can’t be more happy for them to get that win,” Calhoun said. “We’ve not had a lot to show for it record wise, so to see them come out tonight and execute better than the way we have. We fought that weather delay, and you don’t know how kids are going to react to that. I’m proud of them for sure.”
Mitchell Towns completed 10-of-11 passes and had 147 total yards of offense in the first half for the Rebels, throwing two touchdown passes and running one in. Towns capitalized on having a short field most of the night, producing scoring drives of 40, 39 and 30 yards to build a 20-0 lead. He connected with Cole Turner on the first score, while John Paul Head ran in the second from 1 yard out and Robert Warnock had a 5-yard reception for the third score.
“When you have those short fields you have to take advantage of it. It was good special teams play and our defense was flying around. They were doing a heck of a job for their first shutout of the season. When you can put all three phases together, they all play on each other. It was a heck of a team win,” Calhoun said.
Late in the second quarter, Vestavia produced one of its more impressive drives, using 1:28 to go 82 yards on four plays to make it 27-0. A 56-yard reception by Max Stewart moved the ball into the red zone, followed two plays later by an 8-yard Towns touchdown run.
Not long after Vestavia missed a 38-yard field goal to close the first half, the sky opened up and drenched the stadium for more than an hour. As play was set to resume at 9:15 p.m., more lightning delayed the second half for an additional 30 minutes. With the new Wildcat Stadium synthetic turf surface drained, play resumed at 9:45 p.m.
It took Vestavia a little while to get going in the third quarter, but the Rebels scored 16 points in the final 2:48 of the quarter to stretch their lead to 43-0. Towns and Turner connected for a 6-yard touchdown with 2:48 remaining, followed 13 seconds later by an Andrew Sykes sack and safety. Fort Edmonds took over at quarterback and produced a five-play, 50-yard scoring drive, capped by his 1-yard touchdown run as time expired.
Three plays into the third quarter, Jay Faulkner stripped and recovered a fumble at the Tuscaloosa County 26 to set up a four-play drive. Pierce Hanna powered his way in on a 2-yard run to cap Vestavia’s scoring, 50-0, with 8:57 to play. Jack Davis also had a takeaway in the game, intercepting a pass on the next possession.
Towns finished the night with 161 yards and three touchdowns on 12-of-17 passing. Turner accounted for 74 yards receiving on seven catches.
The Rebels’ 50 points are the most since Buddy Anderson’s last victory, 52-27 over Shades Valley last Oct. 30, and the first shutout since a 53-0 win over Huffman to close the 2019 regular season.
Vestavia (1-4, 1-2 in Class 7A, Region 3) will have a week off before hosting Thompson on Oct. 1.