Winona Christian football coach Ashley Kuhn has said that quarterback Brannon Hill is a real dual threat.
Hill showed off the arm and the legs with 221 yards of offense as he led the Stars to a 35-7 win over Manchester on Friday night.
The Stars improve to 2-1 on the season with the win and will travel to Indianola this week to take on the 1-2 Colonels.
It was a dominating performance from Hill and the Stars who scored the first four times they touched the ball and raced out to a 28-0 halftime lead.
“I was really pleased with how we came out,” Kuhn said. “I thought we came out and established the running game and took care of business. We came out and got a couple of three and outs on defense and scored the first four times we had the football. We led 28-0 and they were never really able to get anything going. I was really pleased with our start and thought we played really well. We did have a turnover going into the half and could have scored 35 in the first half and that was disappointing. But we got it going in the second half. I was just really pleased with how we came out and jumped on them and took care of business.”
The Stars got things rolling in the first half as Hill scored the first touchdown on a 1-yard run. Hill then hit Braxton Leach for the two-point conversion and the Stars led 8-0.
The second touchdown came from the passing game as Hill hit Leach on a 29-yard touchdown pass. The try for two failed and Winona Christian led 14-0.
The Stars continued to pour on the points as Hill scored on a 20-yard run and then hit Leach on a two-point conversion to take a 22-0 lead.
The Stars finished out the half with a 1-yard run from Will Irwin. The try for two failed and Winona Christian led 28-0 at the half.
“We really ran the ball well and passed it efficiently,” Kuhn said. “We threw the ball we had the opportunity and I thought we executed well in the passing game. I thought it was our best rushing performance of the year. We led 28-0 at the half and our objective was to get to 35 points and get the clock rolling. We did that and got a bunch of young kids some playing time and that’s always good.”
The Stars got the ball to start the second half and marched down the field and scored on a 25-yard pass from Hill to Leach. Evan Williams hit the PAT and the Stars took a 35-0 lead.
Manchester added a second-half score for the final margin.
The Stars had a big night on offense with 291 yards rushing and 83 passing for 374 yards of total offense. Hill led the rushing attack with 138 yards and two TDs on 10 carries while Irwin had 56 yards on 15 carries. Braxton Leach had 34 yards on seven carries while Bryson McKnight had 27 yards on three carries. Hunter Land also had 26 yards on six carries. Leach also had a good night in the passing game with five catches for 71 yards while Hill was 6-of-8 passing for 83 yards and two TDs.
This week’s game
The Stars will hit the road this week as they head to Indianola.
The Colonels are 1-2 on the season with wins over Benton (20-0) and losses to North Delta (43-13) an Lee (49-7).
“They are your typical Indianola team,” Kuhn said. “You know what they are going to do but they are good at it. They have struggled at times but won last week. You can tell that they are starting to figure things out. We are going on the road and we have never had much success there and it can be hard to get over that hump. It’s a tough place to win. The weather could be a factor this week again so that’s something else we will have to deal with.”
Winona Christian won last year’s game 17-0.
