Trojans sabotage Black Bears' homecoming
By RYAN RICHTER
Sports writer
If the Sterling Black Bears could do it over, they might think twice before choosing the Trojans as their opponent for Friday's homecoming game.
Sure, the Black Bears beat Nickerson a week ago, a team that's only victory is against Hillsboro.
But Sterling has only beaten the Trojans twice in the past 15 years.
Hillsboro's backfield of Spencer Brown, Jake Yoder, and Ishmael Morris, was too strong for the Black Bears as the Trojans rolled.
The Black Bears (2-3) found out how good HHS is with Brown and Yoder combining for 254 yards and four of the Trojans' (3-2) five touchdowns.
What looked like a battle, proved to be a nightmare for the Black Bears.
The improving Hillsboro defense limited the high-powered backfield trio of Joey Stromberg, speedster Steve Fankhauser, and quarterback Cody Riggs, to 197 yards of total offense — all on the ground.
Outside of Stromberg's game-high 147 yards, Hillsboro held the Bears' other three ball carriers to 50 yards and swiped two interceptions that turned into 14 points.
"We set the guys in the right spot on defense and we changed the practice format on defense a little bit," Trojan coach Len Coryea said. "We're working more on defense every day, and less on offense. Our defensive line is getting better."
The only completions the strong-armed Riggs made were to Trojans Brown and Grant Schneider, which punished him for the mistakes.
Brown carried 10 times for a team-high 128 yards and two touchdowns, the first, a 69-yarder that put Hillsboro in control on its first possession of the game.
The Bears trimmed the lead to 7-3 with just more than a minute gone by in the second quarter on a 28-yard field goal by Kholby Munoz.
Yoder and Brown answered though, with Yoder pushing the lead to 14-3 with his first of two touchdowns — a three-yard run — and Brown hooked up with Daniel Jost to cap off a 58-yard drive that sent Hillsboro to halftime with a 20-3 cushion, after the extra point was no good.
"I think that last score before the half really hurt them," Coryea said. "That was a great drive by us, they played really well. They blocked that extra point, I thought 'oh great, here we go again'."
Sterling never threatened the rest of the game when its best chance at a touchdown was wiped out by Schneider's pick.
The Trojans play host to 4-1 Smoky Valley at 7 p.m. Friday.
The Vikings' have an eight-game winning streak against the Trojans and this season's lone loss came to third-ranked Hesston.
