Nampa ends Tiger's hunt for perfect season

Mountain Home High School football coach Brian Floyd was frustrated after the team's 54-7 loss to Nampa.

"The frustrating thing about that game, is it's one thing to get beat, but it's another thing to tie yourself to a pole and give them a bat," Floyd said.

"That's what I think we did. We gave them everything that they could possibly want and that's why it was 54-7."

The loss was the first of the season for the Tigers as they saw their win streak snapped at five.

The game started out like it was going to be anybody's ball game. The two teams both went three-and-out and exchanged punts.

Mountain Home's second possession produced a first down before they punted the ball back to Nampa.

The Bulldogs then went 63 yards in seven plays, Cole Rivera taking it the final four yards for the score. Jonathon Toscano's PAT made it 7-0, Nampa, with 3:23 left in the first quarter.

The Tigers picked up another first down on their next possession before being forced to punt. A personal foul penalty by Nampa on the punt kept the Tigers' drive alive, and they ended up going 80 yards in 12 plays, Tallon Pauley taking it in from three yards out for the score. Chris Maholick tied the game at 7-7, with his PAT with 11:48 left in the first half.

For Mountain Home, the cloudy, rainy night would get darker, as their offense was pretty much shut down the rest of the night, the Bulldogs scoring 47 unanswered points the rest of the game -- 27 of them in the second quarter.

Nampa marched down the field their next possession, going 95 yards in 14 plays, consuming nearly seven minutes on the drive, capped off by Cole Rivera on a 26-yard run. Jonathon Toscano's PAT made it 14-7, Nampa, with 4:42 left in the half.

Mountain Home's next possession produced two incomplete passes sandwiched in between a short gain on a running play, forcing another Tiger punt, but the snap from center was a bouncer that punter Joshua Bush was not able to pick up. Billy Derome managed to field the ball, but had nowhere to run, and was tackled at the Tiger six-yard line.

Nampa went for the jugular, Quaid Morris connecting to Miles Hunsinger on a six-yard score on the first play. With the PAT, it was now 21-7, Nampa, with 3:38 left in the half.

The Bulldogs were just getting warmed up.

After the Tigers went three-and-out, and punted back to Nampa, Quaid Morris connected with Ellis Gonzalez streaking down the sidelines on a 68-yard touchdown pass. The PAT was good, making it 28-7, Bulldogs.

Mountain Home went backwards on its next possession and was forced to punt from their 17. The Bulldogs took over on their own 47 with 1:25 left in the half. Six plays, 53 yards and 78 seconds later, Quaid Morris hit Josh Seward on a 20-yard scoring strike to make it 34-7 Nampa at halftime.

Mountain Home is noted for their half-time adjustments that have been instrumental in their first five wins, but none came that could stop the bleeding in the second half.

Nampa received the ball to start the second half, and moved down the field 67 yards in 10 plays, taking 3:35 off the clock, Cole Rivera scoring his third touchdown of the night, this one from a yard out. With the PAT, it was 41-7 Nampa with 8:25 left in the third quarter.

Jesse Donez ran back the Nampa kickoff to the Tiger 45-yard line. Tallon Pauley picked up a first down on a 10-yard run, but the Tigers turned the ball over on downs at the Nampa 37.

Nampa continued to move the ball, mixing passes and runs, going 63 yards in 12 plays, Kip Ramos taking it in from 10 yards out for the score. The PAT was no good, but Nampa led, 47-7, with 1:56 left in the third quarter.

Mountain Home's next offensive series managed to pick up a first down before it ended with a pass interception.

The Bulldogs went to their second-string quarterback and running back, but it didn't seem to matter, and they went down the field 70 yards in six plays, taking just 2:10 off the clock, Mahonri Bostrom scoring from 17 yards out. With the PAT the Bulldogs led 54-7 with 10:00 left in the game.

The two teams then exchanged punts. For Nampa, it was their first punt since their first series in the first quarter.

The Tigers were unable to do anything offensively, and punted the ball back to Nampa, who moved the ball from their own 17 down to the Tiger 21 before running out the clock on a 54-7 Bulldog win.

"They beat us in pretty much every facet of the game," said Tiger football coach Brian Floyd. "We made numerous errors on O-line and D-line, and our linebackers didn't play exceptionally well either. We were calling defensive plays and part of the linemen would go one way, and the other part of the line would go the other way, and that's not good.

"Our special teams, obviously, didn't get the job done. They got two easy touchdowns on our punt team on miscues, and when they get on a roll like that, it's hard to stop.

"What we have to do is learn from it -- watch the film a lot -- and learn from it and go on. We've done that and we're making changes in certain packages that we have, and see who wants to play some football."

Mountain Home managed just 189 total yards -- 148 rushing and 41 passing. Tallon Pauley had 76 yards rushing, Billy Derome, 42, Jacob Viola, 17, Jesse Donez, 10, Nick Stover, five, and Kyle Kerfoot, minus two.

Kyle Kerfoot completed just four of 14 passes for 41 yards.

Jesse Donez caught three passes for 31 yards and Ricky Lee caught one for 10 yards.

Nampa rolled up 413 yards rushing the ball, and passed for 162 yards.

Defensively, Billy Derome led the Tigers in tackles with nine. Tom Hennessey and Chris Maholick both had six, and Mike Heinen, Ethan Standlee and Jesse Donez each had four.

The loss dropped the Tigers to 5-1 on the season and 3-1 in league play, tied with Middleton and Nampa for the conference lead.

After three straight games on the road, Mountain Home is finally home this week, hosting the Skyview Hawks for homecoming. Coaches sometimes dread homecoming week because of the potential for the players to lose focus on the game, but Coach Floyd likes homecoming because of the way the community gets behind the team.

"I've been very pleased with the community support the last three or four years for homecoming. It's been amazing. It's one of the best weeks we've had, and how everybody rallies around it, and especially after getting taken to the woodshed like we did, we need this, and I think we're going to be pretty focused."

Kickoff for Friday night's homecoming game with Skyview is 7 p.m. at Tiger Field.