By Tony Burns
Sports Editor
El Dorado defensive coordinator Justin Wylie can be a bit of a nit-picker when it comes to game film. After looking at the Wildcats’ 37-7 win over Siloam Springs on Friday, even Wylie couldn’t find many nits to pick.
El Dorado forced three straight three-and-outs to start the game and held the Panthers to a paltry 49 yards in the first half. Siloam Springs’ lone score came against the second- and third-team Wildcats with 6:03 left in the fourth quarter.
“We played well the previous week against Benton. You want to come into this game and take care of business and continue playing well and keep the momentum. We feel like we did that,” Wylie said. “They throw the ball quite a bit. But, we put pressure on the quarterback, both of them, all night. It wasn’t a whole lot of blitzing. We had a few but the guys up front got there. We went to a five-front and got pressure that way.
“I felt like it was another step in the right direction.”
Wylie said 23 different Wildcats recorded a defensive stat in the game.
“We played several more than that, which is good,” he added.
Tyrek Rucks had five tackles, including two tackles for loss with a sack and five quarterback hurries. Donovan Walter had three tackles, two for loss, with a half-sack and four QB hurries. Calab Scott had four tackles with a half-sack, one pass breakup and two QB hurries. Keonta Barnes had six tackles, one tackle for loss and one pass breakup. Jacoby Hankton had five tackles with one tackle for loss. Jerric Jefferson had two tackles, one for loss with a sack and a QB hurry. Bishop Foster had three assisted tackles with an interception and a pass breakup. Quentin Frazier had six tackles with two QB hurries. William Artis had an interception and one tackle and Peyton Perry had four tackles.
Wylie did pick a nit, although not necessarily with his players. Foster’s interception, not only stopped a Panthers’ drive, he appeared to return it 95 yards for a touchdown, following a convoy of blockers down the El Dorado sideline.
A flag nullified the touchdown. The officials called the Wildcats for a personal foul, blindside block.
“It should’ve been a touchdown. I’ve looked at that play, probably, 20 times. They called the penalty on Tyrek. It’s the whole safety deal,” said Wylie. “What the officials looked at, they call it swimming upstream. Everybody is going towards our south end zone, except for Tyrek because he’s eyeing the guy that’s closest to Bishop. He’s going to go block him. We teach them to block the man that’s closest to the ball first. That guy is trailing Bishop, probably two or three yards. Tyrek is coming like a missile. What he should’ve done was, when he got there, slow down, put his hands up and screen the guy. But instead, he was like a bull seeing red. He didn’t target him. He didn’t smoke him up high. He hit him about the mid-section. But, that’s where the penalty came out. It’s the whole safety deal. We get a weekly video and they’ve been on that all season long about swimming upstream and hitting a defenseless player. I don’t know if he saw Tyrek coming but his whole body was facing Tyrek.
“The rule is in place but not everybody interprets the rule the same way. That’s the frustrating thing about it.”
Other than a couple 50-50 whistles by the officials, Wylie liked most of what he saw Saturday as he looked at the game film. He didn’t like losing the shutout but was happy with the number of young players who got in on the action.
“Anytime you have the opportunity to get a shutout, you want it,” he said. “Something I was proud of, when they did score on us, there guys who came over to the sideline that were disappointed, saying, ‘I should’ve had him, Coach’ and those type things. So, it was really good to see that it mattered to our guys.
“And, those were really quality reps. We were repping guys against their first-team offense. We had a sophomore, William Artis, who got a pick. He’s getting into the mix. And, it’s really good to see it from a correction standpoint. We gave up a hundred yards rushing in the second half. We can go back on film with those younger guys who were in there and they can see it on film in live game action on why they gained those yards. That’s invaluable, right now.”