Dillon Focused On Harder Practices To Transfer Effort To Friday Night Success

By Billy G. Baker

Publisher

Dillon — It has been a while since Dillon (4-2) has lost two consecutive football games with recent losses to AAAA power Hartville and upstart region for Loris (30-27) just last week and head coach Kelvin Roller knows just how to get the team back on their winning tradition.

“A team is usually going to play on Friday night like they practice during the week,” said Coach Roller. “We need to step it up in practice and make practice as hard as we expect to play on Friday night.

“In all honesty it seemed like every time we got a good drive going against Loris we were stopped by a penalty,” said Coach Roller. “The penalties were 18 against us and only around five against Loris. It was the most penalties we have had in one game in a long time.

“So, if we can practice with a little more focus this week, and cut out all these penalties we should have a strong finish to the season,” said Coach Roller. “Against Hartsville we had three turnovers and we gave up two touchdowns on kick-offs. When you do stuff like that in a game, you usually end up on the short end of the stick.”

Dillon will be playing Aynor for Homecoming this week. “Aynor just comes right at you with a pounding ground game,” said Coach Roller. “They want to put together 16 to 18 play scoring drives and eat the clock. It will be very important for our defense to make some stops against them.”

Against Loris, junior receiver Zay Robertson had another outstanding game with 12 catches for 101 yards and one TD on a 29-yard pass reception. “Zay is having a great junior season and many colleges are starting to call about his play,” said Coach Roller. “I got a call from NC State the other day and they said they were very interested in Zay. (Zay is an honor student in the class room and was the region 200-meter champions in track this past May.)

Against Loris quarterback Rahmond Hamilton completed 10-of-19 passes for 135 yards. Junior running back Jamarion Fling gained 132 yards rushing on 19 carries and he had two touchdowns on runs of 9 and 33 yards. Dan Graves also caught a 14-ysard scoring pass from Hamilton.

On defense, junior linebacker Keriyon Brown had 15 tackles against Loris. LB Daniel Capehart added 11 tackles while DE Ta’marein Rogers (6-1, 180) and LB Kelvion Manning added seven tackles each against the Lions. 

The Dillon offensive line is led by tackles Ky’heim Lester (6-4, 270) and Ke’shawn Ray along with guards Kiele Pompey (6-1, 230) and Mishaad Gilchrist. The center is senior Nicholas Byrd (5-10,220). 

For the season, Hamilton has completed 70-of-126 passes for 901 yards and 10 touchdowns. He has also rushed for 153 yards and one TD.

Fling leads the rushers with 483 yards on 100 carries and 9 TD’s. Dominick Felten is a speedy back who has rushed for 242 yards and five touchdowns.

The top receiver is the sure-handed Robertson with 34 catches for 434 yards and five touchdowns. Ejan Green has caught passes for 185 yards and two scores.

The Nasty Cats of defense are led by Brown after six games with 67 total tackles including six TFL and one sack. Capehart has 56 tackles and Rogers has contributed 34 stops. The next four top tacklers are T Blue (27), Manning (25) and Graves (25).    A. Zeberry and A. Campbell have 21 and 20 tackles respectiverly.