White House shuts out East Ridge, earns Porter 200 wins
By Luke Williams
Connection Sports
If the Pioneers from Chattanooga East Ridge
had hopes of claiming new territory in the Class 3-A state playoffs, an angry land owner in White House took exception. The
Blue Devils threw a knockout punch and ran off the upstart squad from Region 3-3A with a 39-0 shutout, ensuring home field
advantage into the second round.
White House head coach Jeff Porter won his 200th career game as his team advanced to 10-1 on the season
and will host DeKalb County
in the second week of the postseason. And once again, the four teams from Region 4-3A made it a clean sweep over their Chattanooga counterparts,
guaranteeing that one of the teams from the region will be represented in the eastern semifinals.
With White House and DeKalb County set for a rematch of their week eight
showdown, the Sycamore War Eagles will trek east to Gallatin to take on Station Camp. The highest remaining seed will host a quarterfinal
game.
“This was an impressive
night in all three phases of the game, but it was really a reflection of practice – our kids had a really good week
of practice leading up to this game,” said White House head coach Jeff Porter. “They had a really good focus today,
and I just don’t think they are ready to go home. They understand what this time of year means.”
Four Blue Devils ran for touchdowns including
junior Trox Greenwade, who completed 8-of-13 passes for 96 yards and a touchdown and also scored on a 13-yard scramble. East
Ridge quarterback Adam Long was picked off three times in 17 passes by Matt Parker, Chad Neal and Cole Elrod, and the Blue
Devils turn the miscues into points.
Bryan Dixon and Greenwade had touchdown runs in the opening quarter and Matthew Gossett added a 46-yard field goal
for a 17-0 lead. DeMarqus Payne ran in a five-yard score and Zach Duty caught an eight-yard pass as White House led 32-0 at
the intermission, including a two-point conversion run by Greenwade and successful PAT kicks by Gossett.
Senior fullback Cody Allen scored on a brutally physical
11-yard run in the third quarter to cap the scoring. He was also key on defense for the Blue Devils, a unit that was led by
Zack Byrd with seven tackles.
“It
feels great to win tonight, and we’ve got to continue to work on our defense and getting through on pass protection
because we will face a great quarterback (Hunter Poteete) next week,” Allen said.
White House ran 49 plays for 283 yards, but was aided by incredible field position,
starting 5-of-9 drives in Pioneers’ territory. Conversely, Gossett was the weapon for the Blue Devils and his kickoffs
put East Ridge
beginning 7-of-9 drives at the 20-yard-line and the final two beginning at the 21 and 32. The visitors ran just 37 plays for
96 yards in the game.
“It
was a short field, we started on average somewhere around midfield,” Porter explained. “I didn’t realize
it was the first shutout since 2004, but a lot of those times in the last four years, we have been in a situation where we
had the opportunity and played a lot of kids and tonight we did that and helped keep them off the scoreboard.”
White House was 6-of-9 on third down and
scored all six times in the red zone, while East Ridge converted just 1-of-7 on third down and missed both fourth down chances,
entering White House’s side of the field just twice in the game.
“When you look at their drives, the first thing you think of is Matthew Gossett,” Porter
said. “He’s like the 12th man on defense when he kicks the ball like he did tonight. He creates a long
field for our opponent and then we get two early interceptions and the thing that does is just create momentum, and it’s
been very important the last two weeks to get momentum early.”
“This week, I just focused the hardest I could on every single kick, and every day in practice
I was thinking about it and getting ready for this game,” Gossett said. “I was blessed to be able to kick it tonight
and I just went out and did the best I could.”
