On Friday, October 17, the Westside Warriors beat rival Creighton Prep 52-20 to hand the Jays their first loss of the season. It was senior night for the Warriors and this was the 10th straight win for the Warriors in the neighborhood rivalry. The Jays still are looking for their first win against the Warriors since 2017. With the win the Warriors control their own destiny to the number one seed in the playoffs. With a win over the Papio Monarchs Westside will have home field advantage all the way to Memorial Stadium.
The start of the game was about as good as you could get for the Warriors as they recovered a fumble on the opening kickoff and two plays later Westside running back and Creighton Prep transfer Tay Tay Jenkins punched it in from 11 yards out for the first score of the game. Later in the first, after another long run by Jenkins, quarterback Braylen Warren rolled out to his right and found receiver Andrew Tagge for his first touchdown of the season and gave the Warriors a 14 point lead. With a minute left in the first Jenkins broke off another long run 41 yards out for his second score of the game and ending the first quarter with nearly a hundred yards rushing.
Creighton Prep got on the board first in the second quarter with a field goal after a long drive highlighted by an Angelo Walker 32 yard run which would end up being his longest of the day. The Jays then had to kick it away to Jenkins and he bobbed in and out of defenders, weaving his way through the pack and taking the kickoff 90 yards to the house for his second consecutive game with a kickoff return for a touchdown, along with his third score of the day.
“I jogged to set the blocks up and Bryce had a big pancake block,” Jenkins said. “I then found the crease from there, Tagge blocked the kicker and only had to break one tackle.”
The Jays got a touchdown on the board with about four minutes in the half and the Warriors executed a perfect two minute drill offense driving down the field and capping the half with a Warren dash from six yards out to make it 35-10 going into halftime.
The second half was just about the same as the first, absolute domination by the Warriors. Jenkins got his third rushing touchdown early in the quarter, along with a field goal by Everest Scherlizin to make it 45-10 at the end of the third quarter. The fourth was highlighted by Jenkins’ fourth and final rushing touchdown. With a field goal and a garbage time touchdown late in the game by the Jays, the Warriors pummeled the Creighton Prep by a final of 52-20.
The game was dominated on the back of Jenkins who had 196 yards rushing and 326 all purpose yards and five touchdowns. This was Jenkins’ second game against his former team and in total he has 440 yards and seven touchdowns in his two games against the Junior Jays. Although Warren only got 10 attempts to throw the ball, he took full advantage completing 8 of 10 for 108 yards and a touchdown.
For the Jays it was a tough game, especially early with Walker not getting going until the second quarter. By then the Warriors had already stormed out to a four score lead. Walker put up just 89 yards on 19 carries, which is a season low for the running back. The Warriors’ secondary also locked down, holding starting quarterback Jack Lammers to just 60 yards through the air and giving up 124 passing yards, total. For Creighton Prep it was their second lowest scoring day of the season and they are going to try to bounce back next week against Norfolk to try to finish the regular season with one loss.
The Warriors look to punch their ticket to the one seed as their final regular season game of the year is against a 4-4 Papillion La-Vista Monarchs team on the road. This should be a good finisher to the season and should transition the Warriors nicely into playoff football come the end of October. The Warriors and Monarchs face off Thursday, October 23, at PLCS foundation field.
