Pleasant Hill defends home turf in rivalry victory

PLEASANT HILL — As they’ve done in all four of their wins this fall, the Roosters took down their Cass County rival Friday night with a powerful rushing attack and a stingy defense.

Pleasant Hill beat Harrisonville, 29-13, at Eklund Field on senior night. It was the Roosters’ seventh victory in the past eight matchups with Harrisonville. 

The Roosters’ win came one week after they fell at Warrensburg, 36-30, in overtime. That loss ended a two-game win streak, and it was the Roosters’ lone Missouri River Valley Conference West slate.

“As emotional of a game as last week’s was – losing in overtime and playing a great game against Warrensburg – it’s nice to be able to come back and get a win and get back on track,” Pleasant Hill coach Justin Hamilton said Friday night. “It’s good for our morale, good for our kids and good for our community, and it’s good for us moving forward. It’s about getting better every week and I feel like we are doing that.”

Harrisonville was held to seven points until it scored late in the fourth quarter. The Wildcats scored a touchdown on their opening drive of the game.

They drove 65 yards in 13 plays, capping the drive with a TD on fourth down. Junior quarterback Stryker Gilmore ran into the end zone from one yard out to put his team on top 7-0.

Harrisonville (2-5) didn’t score again until there was 2:31 left in the game. The scoring play was a five-yard pass from Gilmore to junior Eli Torres.

The TD pass came six plays after Pleasant Hill senior Jayden Young intercepted a Gilmore pass that was deflected into the air. However, an errant whistle was blown by an official, and the officials said to redo the play. 

The Wildcats picked up the first down on the next play. Their drive continued until they finished it with a TD.

“Early on, we had trouble keeping him in the pocket,” Hamilton said Gilmore’s scrambling ability. “At halftime, I talked to our defense and I told them I feel like that’s all (Harrisonville) had was him getting out of the pocket and scrambling and making plays. We made some adjustments and we tried to take that away. 

“It came down to our how kids need to play with their rules on the backside. But, I thought our defense played well against their option. They should have seven (points), but we’ve also got to learn how to line up and play after a bad call like that happens.”

Pleasant Hill pressured Gilmore 13 times, with Jack Ralston racking up seven QB pressures in the win. The Roosters also picked off HHS twice – Joey Bracken and Young each recorded one INT.

Offensively, Pleasant Hill was efficient. The Roosters scored touchdowns on two of their three possessions in the first half. They marched 36 yards and 63 yards on those two drives.

The first score was a two-yard run by senior running back Mason Boyd, who amassed 75 yards on 10 carries in the win. The next drive ended with a one-yard TD run by junior tailback Emerson Pena, who led the squad with 20 carries for 114 yards.

“We had the ball three times and we scored twice,” Hamilton said. “The first one was more about us shooting ourselves in the foot. One thing we preach with how we play offensively right now is we can’t have negative plays. I don’t care if it’s only a one-yard gain, we can’t have negative plays. We have to keep moving forward. Being able to get two scores on the next two drives with the way the game was going, because they were kind of chewing clock, too, and being able to go into halftime with the lead knowing they got the ball to start the second half was really big for us.”

The Roosters really took control of the game right out of halftime. Harrisonville fumbled the kickoff and the Roosters took over at the HHS 35 yard line.

Five plays later, sophomore running back Carter Hoglen powered through the Wildcats’ defense for a 5-yard TD, putting his team up 23-7. Hoglen finished the game with 66 yards on 14 carries.

“We needed a really big play on special teams,” Hamilton said. “Getting that turnover to start the second half turned into a two-for-one type deal for us. That was big.”

The Roosters added one more score in the middle of the fourth quarter. Hogled scored his second TD of the game with a seven-yard run.

“We have three backs who are running really well and they are lead blocking for each other,” Hamilton said. “They are unselfish. We are rotating a different guy in every play. Even Geoffrey Murray, who doesn’t get a lot of a ton of playing time, ran the ball well for us at the end. We’ve got a constant rotation and unselfish football, and that’s that I’m proud of our kids about the most.”

Pleasant Hill (4-3) will finish out the regular season with two road conference games. This week, it will travel to Odessa (5-2) for a game at 7 p.m. Friday. Odessa won last year’s game 26-21.

“We’ve got a big one next week,” Hamilton said Friday night. “We’ve go our work cut out for us. Odessa is a physical football team. I haven’t watched them a lot, but I’ve kind of glanced at them. They play physical football, but so do we now. We’re excited for the opportunity.”