varsity.roanoke.com

FOREST -- Jefferson Forest High football coach Don Rice looked members of his team in the eye and told them simply that they had played an almost perfect game against Staunton River Friday night.

Another way to put it:

Goode job.

Running back Desmond Goode plowed through the Golden Eagles for 197 rushing yards and four touchdowns, as the Cavaliers were swamping their Seminole District rivals 44-17 to spoil the coaching debut of Rick Witt.

Witt, who assumed the head coaching job at his alma mater after working as an assistant coach at William Byrd, summed up the capabilities of the 6-foot-1, 180-pound Goode neatly:

"He's quick, isn't he?"

Tough, too. On just about every one of his touchdowns, one of the Eagles got a solid shot in on him but couldn't bring him down.

On his most spectacular run, Wesley Gates had a handful of Goode's jersey but couldn't hold on as the running back cut back across the grain and scored from 70 yards out.

"The thing I liked was he came right over to the bench and told our linemen he couldn't have done it without them," Rice said.

Staunton River scored first on a 30-yard Chris McCabe field goal, but after that, couldn't hold off the relentless Cavaliers rushing attack. Jefferson Forest had 333 yards on the ground.

"We were outmanned," Witt said. "They were bigger and stronger than us at every position. We're obviously very young, but I don't want to make excuses. We've got a lot of work to do."

The Eagles kept coming all night, closing out the scoring with 6:48 left when Meech Coles ran though the Cavaliers reserves for a 41-yard touchdown. Gates added the two-point conversion.

Jefferson Forest had one of those, too, albeit an unplanned one. Kicker Josh Storm, who belted two of his kickoffs into the end zone, scrambled to pick up a poor snap after Jeff Brown's 2-yard scoring plunge with 11:56 left. Then buying time until somebody popped open, rifled a pass to Zack Cox to make it 42-9.

The Cavs subsequently added a couple more points when an Eagles snap went out of the end zone on a punt attempt for a safety.

Staunton River responded with the Coles jaunt.

Goode came to the stadium ready to run.

"The base plan was to pound the rock," he said. "Coach said all week that we were going to pound the rock. We started with some inside runs. Then we stretched it and late in the game, they got tired.

"That's when I started to turn it on."

Staunton River 3 6 0 8--17

Jefferson Forest 10 17 7 10--44

S McCabe 30 field goal

J Goode 14 run (kick failed)

J Rosser 3 run (Storm kick)

J Goode 7 run (Storm kick)

S Fike 1 run (kick failed)

J Goode 70 run (Storm kick)

J Goode 3 run (Storm kick)

J Brown 2 run (Cox from Storm)

J Safety, football snapped out of end zone

S Coles 41 run (Gates run)

SR JF

First downs 7 13

Yards rushing 171 333

Passes C-A-I 2-7-0 2-10-1

Yards passing 36 51

Penalties-yards 3-20 6-40

Fumbles-lost 3-1 1-0

Punts-average 6-29.4 1-9

Individual statistics

RUSHING -- Staunton River Coles 9-68, Gates 10-21, Powers 1-1, Fike 4-19, Jones 10-57, Combs 1-4. Jefferson Forest Goode 14-197, Hall 10-73, Jones 6-20, Brown 1-2, Rosser 4-27, Rhodes 2-6, Wallman 1-1, Harrison 1-8.

PASSING -- Staunton River, Jones 2-7-0 -- 36. Jefferson Forest Hannell 2-10-1 -- 51.

RECEIVING -- Staunton River, Hobbs 1-27, Dillon 1-9. Jefferson Forest Carter 1-32, Engledove 1-19.