Tigers defeat Jerome 16-7

Wednesday, October 1, 2003

Football may not often be compared with a chess match, but it certainly is a case of taking advantage of what your opponent gives you.

That certainly proved to be the case Friday night at Jerome, where the Mountain Home Tigers beat the Jerome Tigers 16-7.

After watching film of Tiger quarterback Brock Zamora running the option for 146 yards and four touchdowns against Boise, Jerome coach Terry Waitley prepared his defense to make sure there was a body on him every time he attempted to run the ball.

The result was five rushes for just four yards for the Tiger junior, nor did the other Tiger runners have much luck running against Jerome's huge line.

Mountain Home Tiger head coach Tony Kerfoot, seeing that the running game was having its troubles, looked for a weakness in the Jerome defense. It appeared to be in their secondary, and the result was 140 yards through the air, leading to two Mountain Home touchdowns.

While 140 yards may not seem like much, Mountain Home had accumulated just 126 yards through the air in their first three games of the season.

Kerfoot was pleased to see the passing game step up.

"That was nice to see, and I think we needed that. Hopefully, that'll help us confidence-wise, and hopefully, maybe get people to respect that we can throw a little bit. We did what we had to do to win. and I think that was the big thing."

Mountain Home took advantage of a Jerome fumble to score their first points of the game. After recovering a fumble on the Jerome 17, Mountain Home moved the ball down inside the five-yard line, before settling for a 23-yard Stephen Reinschmidt field goal that made it 3-0 Mountain Home, with 4:24 left in the first quarter.

Jerome had its best drive of the night, which took up most of the second quarter, as they had the ball for 16 plays, moving from their 19-yard line down to the Mountain Home 28.

On a fourth down play, Jerome's quarterback Brett Boesiger was sacked at the Mountain Home 32. Mountain Home took over and from there, a pass interference call against Jerome moved the ball out to the 46, and then Keith Yagues threw a halfback pass to Mike Thornsberry for a first down at the Jerome 15.

Two plays later Brock Zamora connected with Thornsberry on a 15-yard touchdown pass. A bobbled snap on the PAT try led Zamora to pick up the ball and try to run it in, but he was tackled short of the end zone. Mountain Home led 9-0 with 2:12 left in the half.

Mountain Home was hoping to add to its lead when they got the ball in the third quarter, but a fumble on the first play turned the ball over to Jerome at the Mountain Home 19. Four plays later, Clay Swan took it on from the five-yard line for what would be Jerome's only touchdown. Swan added the PAT to cut Mountain Home's lead to 9-7 just 99 seconds into the second half.

Jerome had a chance to take the lead early in the fourth quarter, but Clay Swan's 43-yard field goal was wide left.

Mountain Home then mounted an 80-yard, 10-play drive, with Brock Zamora completing a nine-yard pass to Mike Thornsberry for the score. Stephen Reinschmidt's PAT was good, and it gave Mountain Home a 16-7 lead with 7:15 left in the ball game.

That would prove to be all the scoring on the night, as the Mountain Home Tigers evened their season record at 2-2.

"It's nice to go on the road and get one (win)," said Coach Kerfoot. "It's not always easy to get one down at Jerome.

"I think the defense stepped up and basically, if we didn't fumble down there inside the 20, we throw a shutout at those guys.

"I thought we did a real good job defensively, and offensively, I thought that Jerome was tougher on defense than maybe we thought they would be going in. They kind of made us struggle there for a while, although I think we got it figured out by the time the game was over."

Mountain Home rushed the ball 34 times for 101 yards. Matt Maurer had 43 yards on 11 rushes. Billy O'Brien carried the ball nine times for 39 yards. Anthony Pomerlee had four rushes for 24 yards, Brock Zamora carried five times for four yards, and Keith Yagues ended with five rushes for minus nine yards.

Brock Zamora completed six of 12 passes for 95 yards and two touchdowns. He also had one pass picked off. Keith Yagues completed one of two passes for 45 yards.

Mike Thornsberry caught five passes for 117 yards and two touchdowns. Shawn Morin had one catch for 23 yards, and Billy O'Brien had one for 0 yards.

The Jerome Tigers rushed the ball 35 times for 75 yards and a touchdown, and passed for 44 yards.

Defensively, Matt Maurer led the Tigers with 20 tackles, including five solo tackles, a sack and a fumble recovery. Kole Spaulding was in on 17 tackles and had a sack. Tyson Sessions had 13 tackles, including four solos, and knocked down two passes. Caom Hansen had 11 tackles, including three solos and three sacks. Josh Stanek had 10 tackles including a sack.

Ariel Santos, a 5' 9" 160 pound sophomore moved up from the JV squad, had seven tackles, including two solos and a sack. Shawm Morin also had seven tackles, and picked off a Jerome pass.

The win evened the Tigers' season record at 2-2.

Kerfoot is pleased to have a two-game win streak as momentum going to Kuna Friday for their SIC 4A conference opener.

"That's awfully nice. Kuna's a very fine ball club, and we've got our work cut out for us this week, but there again, I look at Kuna and they've got some good kids, but I also look at what we've played, and the kids we've played on those teams are better, if not every bit as good as what Kuna's got, so I think we should be pretty well prepared for them."

Among Kuna's four wins is a 37-22 victory over the Jerome Tigers at Kuna. Kickoff for Friday night's game is 7 p.m. at the new Kuna High School football field.

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