Skyview thwarts Mountain Home

The Mountain Home Tigers jumped out to an early lead, but then sputtered, as the Skyview Hawks came back to beat the Tigers 37-16 Friday night at Tiger Field.

Ricky Castillo picked off a Hunter Hyde pass and returned it to the Skyview 18-yard line to set up the Tigers' first score.

Jake Hennessey passed six yards to Colton Zamora for the score. Dion Salinas booted the PAT to make it 7-0, Tigers, with 4:50 left in the first quarter.

Mountain Home got the ball right back as Colton Zamora recovered a Skyview fumble on the Hawks' seven-yard line. A procedure penalty hurt the Tigers' scoring drive and they settled for a 27-yard field goal by Dion Salinas to take a 10-0 lead with 3:09 left in the first quarter.

The score stayed at 10-0 until late in the first half, when Skyview put together a 72-yard scoring drive capped off by a one-yard run by Tanner Robison. The PAT was no good, and Mountain Home led 10-6 with 3:08 left in the first half.

A botched fake punt by Mountain Home gave the Hawks the ball at the Tigers' 18-yard line. It took six plays, but Hunter Hyde passed to Tanner Robison for an eight-yard touchdown with 22 seconds left in the half to give Skyview a 12-10 lead at halftime.

Mountain Home received the ball to start the second half, but in less than two minutes the Hawks took the lead, as Matt Wymore intercepted a pass and ran it back 50 yards for a score.

Skyview passed for two to go up 20-10 with 10:04 left in the third quarter.

Mountain Home then put together a 63-yard scoring drive, Jake Hennessey passing 15 yards to Tyler Wright for the touchdown. The PAT kick was no good, but the Tigers had cut the Skyview lead to 20-16 with 8:27 left in the third quarter.

Skyview, helped out by a couple of major penalties by Mountain Home, scored again late in the third quarte, Hunter Hyde hitting Walker Ray on a 21-yard scoring strike. With the PAT, the Hawks led 27-16 with 1:33 left in the third quarter.

A Tiger fumble set up the Hawks' next score, as they recovered on the Mountain Home 17-yard line. The Tiger defense held, forcing a field goal, which was converted by Mitchell DeFord with 4:32 left in the game to put the Hawks up 30-16.

Mountain Home was forced to punt on its next possession, but the center's snap sailed over Jake Hennessey's head. He tried recovering it in the end zone but was ruled down at the Mountain Home one-foot line. Charlie Kido took it in from there, and with the PAT, it was 37-16, Skyview, with 3:09 left in the game.

Neither team scored the rest of the way as the Hawks clinched a playoff berth with the victory over the Tigers.

"I thought we started really well," said Tiger football coach Brian Floyd. "The ball kind of didn't bounce our way in the second half, but we started really well and put a lot of pressure on them, and we made a few mental mistakes in the third quarter that cost us big.

"They got a lot of wide-open touchdowns from (blown) coverage, and we had about two or three bone-head plays on offense that really hurt us," Floyd said.

Curtis Jackson led the Tigers' running game with 75 yards on 10 carries, but for the game, the Tigers had only 15 rushing yards on 22 attempts.

Juan Silva was the only other Tiger runner with positive yards. He had three yards on two carries. Tyler Wright carried once for minus three yards, Colton Zamora had two rushes for minus three yards, and Jake Hennessey had seven for minus 46 yards.

Hennessey completed 16 of 30 passes for 118 yards and two touchdowns. He had two passes picked off. Alex Rodriguez competed a pass for two yards.

J.T. Cristobal caught six passes for 53 yards, Tyler Wright had four catches for 32 yards and a touchdown, Colton Zamora caught two passes for 13 yards and a score, Curtis Jackson had two catches for 11 yards, Tyler Knauth caught one for 10, Hennessey caught a two-yard pass, and Ricky Castillo had one catch for minus one yard.

Jessie Corbett led the Tigers defensively with 17.5 tackles, Colton Zamora had 7.5, Ricky Castillo had six. and Adam Miller four. Tyler Wright, Anthony Castillo and Alex Rodriguez each had 3.5 tackles, Curtis Jackson had three, Dion Salinas 2.5, John Ryan 2, James Simon 1.5, Luke Filipovich, Adam Perry and Jamz Wright had one each and Tyler Knauth was credited with half a tackle.

The Tigers, now 3-5 overall and 2-4 in league play, close out their season at Emmett this Friday night.

Coach Floyd believes his Tigers will be ready for the Huskies.

"It's going to be a tough test to go over there on their Senior Night, because they play much better at home, but after what I saw from our guys Friday night -- that was our best intensity and we had pretty good execution. Skyview's a pretty good team. I thought we played better than them and looked like the better team for about two and a half quarters or so.

"If we can fix our little problems, we can go from there, and the guys want to carry that momentum on over to this week against Emmett."

Kickoff is 7 p.m. Friday at Emmett High School.