Badgers overwhelm Hippos for first playoff berth since 2000 Posted On: Saturday, Nov. 7 2009 05:40 AM By Nick Talbot
Killeen Daily Herald

LAMPASAS – Twenty straight losses, nine years since a playoff berth and little respect.

Before the season began, those were the most accurate descriptions of the Lampasas football program. In fact, the last time the Badgers made the playoffs was in 2000, when they lost 18-7 to Magnolia in the bi-district round. To make matters worse, they had only made the playoffs four times since 1990 – a span of 19 seasons.

The Badgers (4-6, 3-3 in 25-4A) erased all of those demons Friday with a 47-20 win over the Hutto Hippos at Badger Stadium.

"I knew we had to do a lot of things to get here," said Lampasas coach Joey McQueen. "… things just started to fall into place. It is amazing.

"My coaching staff believed in it and then you have an old bald-headed guy like me who expects things and is old school … but the kids bought into it. There might be some (people) that might not like it, but it does not matter to me, because I know what it takes to win and this staff and these kids proved that."

That philosophy – "pound the rock and run the clock" – worked to perfection in the 27-point win. Edward Hall and Brode Dubose combined for 240 yards and four touchdowns as Lampasas held onto the ball for nearly 30 minutes, compared to only 18 for the Hippos (5-4, 2-4).

"I come into every game with a mindset of 250 yards and four touchdowns,"

Hall said. "Me and Brode together probably got that tonight."

But the ground game did not steal the whole show.

That honor belonged to Vann Millican and the passing game. The senior quarterback

was 3-of-3 for 88 yards and two touchdowns – doubling his season total. Millican's only other touchdown pass this season was a 25-yard strike to Astin Murray in the Badgers 42-21 win against Dripping Springs on Oct. 16.

In fact, coming into the game, he was 3-of-12 passing for 43 yards for the entire season.

He surpassed those totals on two plays.

The first was a 52-yard pass to Brandon Abbott on a post route down the middle of the field that put the Badgers up 7-0.

"They were crowding the line and we knew we had to do it and it worked," McQueen said.

Millican's second touchdown pass was a 12-yard screen pass that Aaron Reyna took the corner on, leaped and just cleared the end zone pylon.

"That was just a goal-line play and I just turned around and he was wide open," Millican said. "You got me. I don't know (where the passing game came from), but I think we needed it."

The play capped off a 12-play, 77-yard drive that took more than seven minutes off the clock.

Reyna's biggest play was still to come, though.

The senior wide receiver took the opening kickoff of the second half and returned it 95 yards for the touchdown.

Two plays later, Lampasas had the ball back. The Hippos fumbled and the Badgers recovered the ball at the Hutto 28. Five plays later, Hall gave the Badgers a 34-7 lead.

Hutto, who also is primarily a running team, scored its first two touchdowns thanks to its passing game. Junior quarterback Alondre Thorn found Trevor Hayes for a wide open for a 63-yard pass in the first quarter and then Joel Rothrock took it in from the 2 to tie the game at 7-7.

The next pass did not come until much later, but it was even longer. Thorn hit a leaping Alex Aday for a 69-yard touchdown pass, but the TD only cut the Badger lead to 21, midway through the third quarter.

Ultimately, the score did not matter. Hall and Dubose carried the Badgers back down the field, engineering an eight-play, 50-yard drive that took six minutes off the clock and ended with a 2-yard run by Dubose. Hall then added another touchdown run late in the fourth to seal the game.

"… If we hold the ball we are going to have a chance to win," McQueen said.

"Our defense only let them have two big plays and we held them the rest of the time."

Contact Nick Talbot at ntalbot@kdhnews.com or (254) 501-7569.