The Sky View Bobcats invited the Roy Royals to town on Friday night and the Bobcats came up victorious; scoring over and over on the turnovers forced by the defense. When the night was over Sky View was crowned the victors beating Roy with a score of 6-to-30. With the victory Sky View moves to 3-5-0 on the season (2-2-0 Region).

The first half of the game was reasonably even as each team traded scores in the first quarter. At 10:10 of the first quarter Alex Watts put the exclamation point on a Sky View drive, busting through Roy’s defense behind good blocking of the offensive line. Senior kicker Josh Egbert added the extra point and just like that the Bobcats were up 0-7.

The Royals showed some signs of life when about five more minutes of game time had ticked off the clock, as Roy’s Marcus Matuatia punched in a 1 yard run. The defense having one of their best performances of the season blocked the extra point and dashed Roy’s chances to tie up the game.

The second quarter was uneventful as the teams battled back and forth, neither team was able to get to the end zone in the second. As the buzzer sounded ending the half Sky View headed to the locker room up 6-to-7.

Halftime was full of events as Sky View opened halftime by naming two former athletes to the Sky View Hall of Fame. Inducted were Justin Wilcock and Nate Harris. Wilcock, who was a diver at Sky View, went on to dive at BYU and eventually represented the United States at the 2004 Summer Olympic Games. Wilcock was not able to attend the ceremony; the award was accepted by his parents. Harris played football and basketball at Sky View, before becoming an Aggie and playing for Stew Morrill at USU. While at USU Harris was selected to first team all-WAC honors on three separate occasions. Harris went on to play professional basketball in Germany. Harris was in attendance for the ceremony and accepted the award with his wife and two children. After the awards ceremony the crowd was entertained by the Sky View marching band.

The second half was the turning point for the Bobcats, Sky View executed well on both sides of the ball. Defensively the Bobcats forced six turnovers in the game coming up with three interceptions, and three fumble recoveries. Yabitse Wells, Milyon Chantry, and Corbin Lee each came up with interceptions in the game. Sky View was able to turn four of those turnovers into scores in the second half. Speaking of the defensive play Head Coach Craig Andher had this to say, “They got a couple of fades on us early, but our corners never gave up, they kept working hard. We were able to come up with three interceptions and three fumbles. One of those fumbles was on a special teams play and the others were our defense creating it. They started the half on fire. To come up with that turnover at the beginning of the second half, I felt really helped give us a lot of momentum in that game.”

Sky View went on a scoring frenzy in the third quarter capitalizing on the Roy turnovers. The first score came at 11:06 when Watts closed the drive with a 5 yard touchdown run. Josh Egbert who has been money all year missed his first extra point this season. At 2:30 left in the third Egbert got a chance at redemption, hitting a 23 yard field goal to cap off the drive. With just :57 left on the clock in the third Braxton Godderidge called his own number and crossed the goal line from 5 yards out. As the clock ran out in the third the Bobcats were up 6-to-23. Ander commented, “There is a testament right there of the difference turnovers can make in a game. I don’t think we had any turnovers, and so we were able to protect the ball, punt it when we had to, and then let the turnovers come to us.”

In the fourth quarter Sky View scored twice but only one of them would count. On a fake handoff everyone was fooled including one of the referee’s who blew an inadvertent whistle. However, the play wasn’t quite over when running back Skyler Hunt brilliantly sold the play, got tackled but never had the ball. Godderidge was sprinting around the left side of the field with it and ended up in the end zone. As the Bobcats lined up to kick the extra point the referees stopped the play and had a short conference in the middle of the field.

After the play was called back to the original line of scrimmage, the Bobcats got to replay the down but were unsuccessful in picking up a first down. Lined up for an apparent field goal Sky View had a bit of trickery up their sleeves. Backup quarterback and receiver Mitchell Larson was the holder for the field goal and took the snap. Larson tossed a well placed ball to defensive back turned receiver Garth Jolley who ended up in the end zone before the Royals could recover and stop the play. At 6:36 of the fourth the Bobcats had put the final points on the board and the nail in the coffin of the Royals. The final score ended up at 6-to-30 in favor of the Bobcats after Egbert’s extra point.

Godderidge finished the night completing 7-of-18 passes for 60 yards. Godderidge also called his own number eight times for 20 yards. Mitchell Larson completed 1-of-1 passes for 24 yards and a touchdown. Speaking of how Godderidge managed the game Andher said, “Braxton is such a smart young man, he prepared very well for this. It was a great challenge he wanted to be on the side of the winning score; the last time he started he wasn’t, and so I was very pleased with his preparation and then his ability to go out and execute the game plan.” When asked how he thought he did, Godderige was quick to give credit to the entire team, “I can’t say that I managed the game, I had a great O-line that went out tonight and hit Roy in the mouth, I mean Jorgen McKenna, Josh Watteyne, Sheay (Johnson), JD (Jones), Cody Willmore, and then I had great running backs that went out and ran hard and they got the job done tonight.”

Corey Jensen led the receiving corps grabbing three passes for 38 yards. Garth Jolley’s touchdown catch for 24 yards was second in receiving, followed by Alex Watts who had a catch for 16 yards. Nathan Payne, Corbin Lee and Robert Ercanbrack all had single catches in the game.

After the departure of Sean Gero who has moved out of Cache Valley, the rushing duties were handled in large part by Alex Watts. Watts had twenty carries for 82 yards and two touchdowns. Godderidge was next with his 20 yards followed by Corey Jensen who had 14 yards on two carries, and Tyler Stevens with 10 yards on his single carry. Skyler Hunt had 4 yards on five carries.

The Bobcats had 84 yards receiving and 130 yards on the ground for total of 214 offensive yards.

Defensively the Bobcats registered forty seven tackles and five sacks, handing the Royals a cumulative loss of 40 yards. Garth Jolley, Corbin Lee, Kyle Standing and Connor Chambers each had three solo tackles. Jolley and Lee each had two assists. Tyler Stevens, and Kasey Shaw each had two solo tackles, Stevens registered two assists as well. Ethan Dursteller had six assists, Cole Bangerter had four assists. Tre Hansen had a tackle and four assists. Milyon Chantry had nothing but praise for his fellow defensive players, “Our defense was amazing, I think we had four or five turnovers in a row, we had a couple of mental mistakes but we didn’t let that get us down. We played really decent I think, this is probably the best our defense has played in a long time.”

Sacking the quarterback were Garth Jolley with one and a half for 12 yards lost. Ethan Dursteller and Tre Hansen teamed up for a sack for 5 yards lost. Jaden Camphouse and Connor Chambers had a sack a piece for 9 and 4 yards respectively. Joseph Humphries was in on an assist for a sack of 3 yards lost.

Yabitse Wells had a big night his interception was returned for 23 yards, while he had a kickoff return of 62 yards to start off the game and give the Bobcats great field position in the first quarter.

Milyon Chantry blocked an extra point, while Ethan Dursteller had a blocked punt.

Sky View is 3-2 at home and 0-3 on the road this year. Next week they will travel to Ogden to take on the Lakers of Bonneville in a region game that will have big playoff implications. Kickoff for that game is scheduled for next Friday night at 7:00 p.m.

Game Summary