Hahnville managed to hang tough with Destrehan throughout the first half, but in the end the Wildcats proved to be too much for the Tigers to handle, snapping Hahnville’s three-game win streak with a 33-7 loss.
Though a loss to a rival is always tough to swallow, Hahnville head coach Lou Valdin was proud of the resiliency his squad showed.
“We played hard, our effort was good, and we kept playing hard even when the game was out of reach,” he said.
The previous week, the Tigers were able to overcome numerous penalties and turnovers on their way to a 28-0 win over John McDonogh. That wasn’t the case last week.
Hahnville had two costly interceptions, one of which was returned for a touchdown, and put the ball on the ground three times, losing one. The Tigers were also penalized seven times for 65 yards and had a high snap fly into the back of the endzone for a safety.
On the flip side, Destrehan was penalized only three times for 20 yards and didn’t turn the ball over once.
“It all came down to mistakes – we made them and they didn’t,” Valdin said. “Our only chance was to play mistake-free football and we didn’t do that.”
While the Tigers did make some costly mistakes, they kept Destrehan out of the endzone until 4:02 was left in the first quarter, when Wildcat quarterback Wynrick Smothers followed his blockers for 33 yards to give his team a 7-0 advantage.
Destrehan didn’t score again until Ryan Rome split the uprights from 36 yards out to put the Wildcats on top 10-0 with 3 seconds left in the half.
The second half was a different story.
Rufus Porter intercepted a Guiseppe Crovetto pass and returned it 44 yards to give the Wildcats a 17-0 lead in the third, and Smothers connected with Brandon Armstrong on a pair of huge touchdowns to put the game out of reach.
And while the final score ended up 33-7, Hahnville out rushed Destrehan 97 yards to 86 yards, and ended the game with only 83 less yards of total offense.
The Tigers’ district road gets a little easier this Friday when they travel to take on East Ascension. The Spartans have struggled this year, with their only win coming on a 37-0 victory over O.P. Walker. Their losses this season have come to Denham Springs, St. Charles Catholic, Lutcher and Dutchtown.
East Ascension is coached by John Lambert, who used to be on the Hahnville staff. Valdin says that has the potential to cause some problems for his squad because of all Lambert knows about the Tigers.
“Their offense is very similar to ours, but the scary thing is that their coach used to coach here, so he knows our signals and some of the things we are going to try to do defensively,” Valdin said. “He knows our system.”
Another troubling situation is that this is the first time the Tigers will have to hit the road.
“We can’t worry about how the team is going to react on the road because that’s something we can’t control,” Valdin said. “We only have to travel twice this season and we are going into a very hostile environment.”
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