Huskies outlast Huffman on the road

BIRMINGHAM - An impromptu chant rose from kneeling the Hewitt-Trussville High School football team after it downed Huffman 34-21 Friday night at Vikings Stadium.

Yes sir.

The Vikings’ public address announcer frequently punctuated plays by the home team with the affirmative statement. But the visiting Huskies made the final statement as they made more plays to notch the victory.

“You found a way to win,” coach Josh Floyd told his squad. “No matter how pretty it is or how ugly it is we had to overcome a lot.”

At the top of the list of adversities was the loss of some players to injuries. The visitors were down to their third-string quarterback after having lost their top two in prior games, the most recent last week.

“Seth Shelnutt started the year at quarterback and got hurt,” Floyd said. “Cade Carruth played the last two games and he got hurt last week, so we had Jackson Holland in there. He’s the third quarterback we’ve started in six weeks.”

Then there were a host of penalties against the Vikings.

“We had to overcome tons and tons of penalties,” Floyd said. “It was very difficult to get a rhythm on offense because every time we had a positive play, it came back. We got ourselves in some bad spots – first and 20. To overcome that here at this place, I’m just proud of our guys. I’m excited for our guys finally to win.”

Holland was pressed under center a week ago. While he was a backup signal-caller, he was taken aback when his name was called.

“I’m usually over at safety,” Holland said. “Last week when our second string (quarterback) got down, they called my name and I was like, ‘Oh gosh.’”

A week of practice had the junior ready for the task at hand. He accounted for three touchdowns, two on runs and one on a pass to Dazalin Worsham.

“We had a good game plan going in,” he said. “I knew what I was going to do. One of my strengths is running the ball, and we wanted to run the ball more.”

Holland finished with 13 carries for 58 yards. Clint Simpson paced the victors on the ground with 10 carries for 76 yards.

Defensively, Justice Finkley caused problems all night for the Vikings.

“He just tears up offensive lines,” Holland said. 

Across the way, Huffman coach Alex Wilson was visibly disappointed.

“We had a couple of drive-killers,” Wilson said. “The kids played hard. We’ve just got to eliminate mistakes.”

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