The Longview Lobos will square off against the Ruston Bearcats at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. Expect the scorekeeper to be kept busy: if their previous games are any indication, the two teams will really light up the scoreboard.
Longview is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of Texas' top teams: South Oak Cliff, who was ranked tenth in their home state at the time (Longview was ranked 23rd). Longview and South Oak Cliff were almost perfectly matched up on Friday, but Longview suffered a 45-44 loss. Despite running the score up even higher than they did in their prior game last Friday (42), the Lobos still had to take the loss.
Despite the defeat, Longview got top-tier performance from Kelvin Washington, who rushed for 108 yards and two touchdowns on only nine carries, and also picked up 32 receiving yards and a touchdown. Another player making a difference was Maverick Rowe, who threw for 200 yards and three touchdowns while completing 81.8% of his passes.
Meanwhile, Ruston had already won 14 in a row dating back to last season (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 19.3 points), and they went ahead and made it 15 on Friday. They took their matchup at home with ease, bagging a 49-10 victory over the Panthers. The match was pretty much decided by the half, when the score had already reached 28-7.
Having lost for the first time this season, Longview fell to 2-1. As for Ruston, they pushed their record up to 2-0 with that win, which was their ninth straight at home dating back to last season.
Everything came up roses for Longview against Ruston in their previous matchup back in September of 2018 as the squad secured a 56-28 victory. One of the biggest obstacles trying to stand in the way of that victory was Ruston's Eric Outley, who rushed for 130 yards and three touchdowns on only 13 carries, and also threw for 238 yards while picking up 11.3 yards per attempt. Now that he won't be playing on Friday, will it be easier for Longview to walk away with another win? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
