Walterboro -- In the first football game in school history, the Hampton County High School Hurricanes defeated Colleton County 10-0 to win the first Border Bowl at Cougar Stadium.
The two Lowcountry counties border each other, hence the name for the game. Hampton County is a AA school while Colleton County is AAAA.
“It wasn’t pretty, but it is very special to come out of here with the first win in school history,” said Hampton County head coach Rob Hanna.
Hampton County High came into being when the decision was made to close Estill and Wade Hampton and merge the student bodies.
Hampton County is ranked fifth in the High School Sports Report AA Preseason Top 20 poll. Hanna, who was the head coach at Wade Hampton, was happy to get the first win out of the way in the first game.
"II am excited for getting win No. 1. We played with a lot of effort and heart tonight” said Hanna. “Any time you can come into Cougar Stadium and come out with a win it’s a good night.”
“I was proud of the way we handled the adversity and it started from the start on the fumbled kickoff. Our defense came up big and it set the tone for the game.”
Hampton County fumbled the opening kickoff, and it was recovered by Colleton County’s Shawn Winfield at Hampton County’s 18-yard line. The Cougars had a touchdown called back due to a holding call on third down at the 5. Then on fourth down the Hurricanes' Donyae Russell burst of the left end and sacked Cougar quarterback Sean Williams for a 6-yard loss.
The Hurricanes took over at their 10 and drove the ball down field to a first down and goal at the Cougar 7. The drive stalled there as the Cougar defense would make its first goal line stand of the night. The Cougar dropped Hurricane quarterback Chris Terry
for an 8-yard line.
“I’m very proud of the effort of our kids. The defense made plays all night to keep us on the game,” said Colleton County head coach Adam Kinloch. “I said we are going to build this team on defense and running the football.”
The Cougar defense gave up some yards, but every time the Hurricanes would venture deep into Cougar territory they were turned back.
The Hurricanes had three drives that went 11 plays, seven plays and again 11 plays, but all ll they managed were three points when Rafe Sullivan scored the first points in school history with a 26-yard field goal in the second quarter.
As good as the Cougar defense was in the first half, the Hurricanes' unit was even better. Led by Ka’Von Chisolm, Mandrell Sanders, Cody Segars and Russell, they held the Cougar offense to just 33 total yards of offense.
The second half continued to be a slugfest as neither team could cross the goal line and entered the fourth quarter still sitting at 3-0.
The Hurricanes finally put the game away when they went on a 57-yard scoring march in seven plays . Zion Dobson scored the first touchdown in school history when he went in from five yards out to make the score 10-0 with 4:24 to go in the game. On the drive, Dobsopn carried the ball four times for 44 yards. He finished the night with 106 yards on 15 carries.
Terry completed 8 of 13 for 116 yards while Hezekiah Abram had fou receptions for 62 yards.
The Cougars were led by sophomore running back Cameron Greyson as he rushed for 113 yards on 14 carries.
“Cameron can be the next great Cougar,” Kinloch said.
The Cougars will host White Knoll next Friday, while the Hurricanes will head to Allendale-Fairfax.
The battle with AF is already a rivalry as the Tigers were the chief rivals for both Wade Hampton and Estill.
“While I’m happy with the win, we have a lot to clean up, especially on offense. We had too many bad plays and penalties. We did move the ball, but we must finish,” Hanna said.
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