Westwood's strong second half proves to much for Austin High to overcome in 41-7 rout
Westwood (2-1) handed Austin High (2-1) their first loss of the season Friday night as they turned it up a notch in the second half to storm to a 41-7 win at the Round Rock ISD Sports Complex.
Warriors sophomore quarterback Ben Johnson connected with his older brother, Will, for two touchdown passes. One score went for 54 yards and the other was a 21-yard toss.
"We came out in the second half and our offensive line played great, our receivers, running backs, everything was amazing," said Westwood Quarterback Ben Johnson. "Coaches did a great job and our defense played the best I have ever seen."
Westwood held Austin High on the first possession of the game forcing them to punt on fourth down. Westwood's Josh Schmiedehaus was then able to get inside the Austin High offensive line and blocked the punt. He found the loose ball, scooped it up, and took it in for the touchdown giving the Warriors an early 7-0 lead.
The Warriors would add to their lead with just over three minutes to go in the first half when the Johnson brothers connected again. This time Ben found Will for the 54-yard touchdown pass helping Westwood take a 14-0 lead.
Austin High got their only score of the game in the second quarter. Starting from their own 1-yard line, Austin High quarterback Jacob Morgan connected with Thomas Coffman on a 78-yard pass play to help cut the deficit to 14-7. From that point on the Westwood defense held the Maroon offense in check.
Westwood held the 14-7 halftime lead and added to that when they took the first possession of the second half and scored on a Johnson 5 yard keeper.
The Warriors special teams then got in on the second half action when they forced a fumble on the ensuing kickoff that allowed their offense to take over at the Austin High 21-yard line. From there it took on play to find the end zone and that happened when Johnson connected with his brother Will for 21-yard scoring strike that pushed the lead to 28-7.
"Offensively it took us some time to get going until we really figured out what we wanted to do," said Westwood Head coach Anthony Wood. When asked about the second half offensive outburst Wood mentioned the senior leadership on the team stepping up. "We have 17 returning starters and we felt like our offensive line was not doing the job we felt they could do. So they stepped up. They said coach if you run the football we can do it, we will take care of it and so we said ok here we go."
Now it was time for the defense to do their thing and it didn't take long. On Austin High's first play from scrimmage Jacob Morgan was picked off and Westwood was once again in the red zone with a first-and-ten. Princeton Collins made sure the great field position paid off for Westwood when he took a hand off and made his way into the end zone to give the Warriors a 35-7 lead.
Stanford commit Jordan Williamson continued his impressive kicking this season when he booted a 52-yard field goal later in the third quarter to send Westwood into the fourth quarter with a 38-7 lead.
"I think the point total was really created by our defense with the turnovers," said Wood. ""We felt our defense kept us in the ballgame the entire first half and we figured it was time we do something to help them out."
Ben Johnson had three touchdown passes on the night with 185 total yards of offense while his brother Will finished with 94 yards receiving.
Morgan was picked off three times in the game but finished with 270 yard passing on 16-of-41. Coffman made six catches on the night for 173 yards receiving and teammate Cayleb Jones had 76 yards receiving with seven catches.
"Once we go done with Lake Travis where they exploited some of our weaknesses we can back and practiced at some things we felt we could get better at," said Wood. "Just seeing some things go the way we practice was really nice."
