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MURFREESBORO – Their names aren’t necessarily known yet, but several Oakland players started to work toward that goal on Thursday evening.
Ray Hughes Stadium was the site of yet another Patriot win, as the two-time defending 6A champs dispatched visiting Hendersonville 42-0 in the season opener for both squads as Oakland ran its winning streak to 31 consecutive games.
And while the names are different – no Jordan James, Antonio Patterson or Isaiah Horton of the past few seasons – the new starters showed they’re plenty capable of building that recognition as the 2022 season wears on.
“We made a few big plays, got real fortunate,” Oakland head coach Kevin Creasy said. “Thought that we had some guys that probably nobody had heard of made some big plays for us.”
Senior running back C.J. Puckett scored a pair of touchdowns where Hendersonville tacklers had a good chance to bring him to the ground. Fellow senior Mason Bell’s 43-yard jaunt in the second quarter was much the same way.
“There was talk about how this team’s going to be, how we’re going to be with everybody leaving,” Puckett said. “So we wanted to prove that we’re still here, we’ve still got players, we’ve still got playmakers and that’s what we put out on the field.”
“C.J.’s one of the strongest guys on the team,” Creasy said. “He’s kind of waited his turn and he’s a senior now. He loves Oakland and wants us to do real well and if it means he’s got to block on a play, he will. If it means he’s got to run a route, he’ll run a route. But he looked really good tonight on a couple of long runs where he just imposed his will.”
And senior Quincy Jackson hauled in a Kade Hewitt pass on the third play of the game for a 93-yard touchdown that sent Oakland off and running less than a minute in.
Count Hendersonville head coach James Beasley impressed.
“As good as the rest of them,” Beasley said when asked his opinion of the Patriots compared to past Oakland teams he’s faced. “This is a team that’s at a high level in the class that we play in and that’s where we’re trying to get to, so we’re going to do everything we can to be playing at this level moving forward.”
Then there’s the defense, which forced and recovered four Commando fumbles and intercepted a pass – which sophomore Bronson Crisp returned 62 yards for a touchdown late in the first half. Senior Jerrell Franklin accounted for the other Patriot score when he scooped a fumble and ran it in from 11 yards out right before halftime. “I thought our defense really played a hard-nosed kind of ball that we’re used to playing around here,” Creasy said. “They played hard, but we probably need to shore up some tackles – lot of guys were going for the big hit. If we can shore up some assignment mistakes and clean up some tackling, we’ve got a pretty good defense that we can lean on.”
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