Photo courtesy of Gary Cosby/Tuscaloosa News
tus_Hillcrest v Vestavia Hills GC
Vestavia Hills' William Tonsmeire Jr. (1) evades a tackle by Hillcrest’s Jordan Steele at Hillcrest High School Friday, Sept. 13, 2024.
WETUMPKA — It’s still almost a month until Halloween, but the Vestavia Hills High School football turned Wetumpka Stadium into a house of horrors for Prattville Friday night, manhandling the Lions 49-14.
With a $17-million renovation of their usual home stadium not complete, the Lions have to travel some 45 minutes to play their “home” games this year, and it was certainly a long bus road home after the Rebels — who were 1-4 coming in — took them to the woodshed.
Riding a rushing attack that put up 314 of Vestavia Hills’ 498 total yards of offense , the Rebels rolled to a 35-0 halftime lead and matched two Prattville second-half touchdowns with two more of their own in their most important win of the season.
“We played a really good first half,” Vestavia Hills coach Robert Evans said. “We played clean, tough football. We just played the way we are supposed to play.”
Vestavia Hills opened the scoring on its first drive of the night, marching 80 yards in five plays to set up Bruce Littleton’s 5-yard plunge for the score. Owen Simpson added the first of seven extra points to make it 7-0.
Sophomore quarterback Charlie Taaffe capped the second drive of the night with a screen pass to wideout Chase Webb that he took right up the middle for a beautiful 14-yard TD connection that made it 14-0 at 5:54 of the first quarter.
Littleton’s second rushing TD of the game capped the next Rebels’ drive as the senior went over from 4 yards out to make it 21-0 early in the second quarter.
Sophomore running back Noah Boylan got in on the scoring action next, crashing up the middle from the 2-yard-line with 7:23 left in the half to make it 28-0.
The Rebels took over again with 2:34 left in the half at their own 20 and zipped down the field to set up Taaffe’s second TD pass of the night, a 26-yarder to Luke Stubbs as the horn sounded. That was five drives and five TDs for an offense that was actually down its top two running backs due to injury.
“Our three-year starter, William Tonsmeire, is out for the season, and our No. 2 running back, Carson Purdy, has not played in three weeks,” Evans said. “So it’s a credit to our offensive coaches to continue to find solid options for us to give the ball to.”
Prattville opened the second half with its first fireworks of the night as QB Gavin Rigdon found wideout Kelvin Blue on a little dump pass over the middle at the Lions’ 26, and Blue took it the rest of the way for a 79-yard score that cut it to 35-7.
Vestavia Hills responded late in the third quarter as Taaffe ran it in from 5 yards out to make it 42-7, and then Carson Mann capped the scoring with a 5-yard plunge up the middle with 10:33 left in the game that made it 49-7.
Prattville’s Triston Blackmon went in from 4 yards with 2:28 left in the game to round out the scoring.
In all, 10 different Rebels recorded a rush, led by Boylan who gained 94 yards on 12 carries. Taaffe added 31 yards on nine carries and was 10-for-11 passing for 184 yards while Webb was the leading receiver with five catches for 107 yards.
The win improves Vestavia to 2-2 in Class 7A, Region 3 and keeps the Rebels firmly in the playoff hunt with key region games upcoming on the road at Oak Mountain (3-3, 1-3) next Friday and at home against winless Tuscaloosa County in two weeks.
It’s a challenge that the Rebels’ tough early-season schedule — their four losses came to teams that all ranked in the top five in Class 7A in last week’s Alabama Sports Writers Association poll — would certainly seem to have prepared them for.
“We control our destiny,” Evans said. “If we win the next two games, we’re in the playoffs. We understand that the ball is in our court now. We’ll have to show up and play clean, tough football again, and that’s what I expect us to do.”
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