Amherst clinches Seminole crown with ugly win at Rustburg

If football games were beauty pageants, Friday night’s Amherst-Rustburg matchup would not have even made it out of the first round.

But thankfully they’re not, and Amherst clinched another Seminole District championship with a 45-0 victory over the Red Devils.

Amherst coach Cecil Phillips told his team often how proud he was of them, despite not playing at times like a state champion football team, and reminded them in the postgame huddle that they still had “unfinished business,” a reference to the Lancers 13-0 loss to Broad Run in last year’s Group AA, Division 4, state championship game at Liberty University. If the Lancers want to get back there this year, there is one thing they will have to fix, the coach said.

“Simple execution,” he said, “Our defense played well tonight, but the offense had trouble executing and the Rustburg defense played well.”

The score would have been even more lopsided were it not for two lost fumbles, including one inside the Red Devils’ 5 by quarterback Anthony Rose.

It was not all bad for the winners on the night. Senior tailback Mario Vaughan had another stellar game, finishing with 124 yards, including a 38-yard TD run that set the Lancers on their way in the first quarter. Following a Tyler Dawson 37-yard field goal, the Lancers forced a three-and-out from Rustburg and a few plays later, Vaughn took the handoff around the end, shed a couple tacklers and accelerated into the end zone to put Amherst up 10-0.

On the ensuing drive, Rustburg was forced inside their 5 and, on a strange play that was initially called a safety, Amherst recovered a fumble by Red Devils senior Jake Gage in the end zone to take a 16-0 advantage after the missed extra point heading into halftime.

The Lancers upped their lead to 23-0 in the third quarter when junior linebacker Jaze Spradley intercepted a Craig Paulhus screen pass and ran it in from 30 yards out. Spradley found the end zone again in the fourth quarter when he caught a shot from Anthony Rose, who scored from 1-yard out in the third quarter, to go up 36-0 after the PAT was blocked by the Rustburg defense. Amherst stepped up again forcing a safety on a bad option pitch from Paulhus to Stacey Charlton, and Josh Braxton capped the scoring with a 31-yard TD run.

Despite all the craziness with holding onto the ball, Amherst held Rustburg to 16 yards of total offense while finishing with 233 yards of its own, including 212 yards on the ground.

“We’re a very young team,” Rustburg coach Jon Berlin said after the game. “And we need help up front,” a reference to the fact that a few key players on the offensive and defensive line were out with injuries.

“But when you’re rebuilding a program, you have to start somewhere.”