Football -- Golden Falcons stop Cougars

By David Williams
Published in Sports on September 12, 2004 2:02 AM

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PIKEVILLE -- Charles B. Aycock football coach Randy Pinkowski was quick to say his team is not yet ready to be considered a contender for the Class 3-A Eastern Carolina Conference championship.

"No. Absolutely not," he said. "We're not that good a football team ... I think we're ready to give a little competition to some folks, but a conference championship? That road goes through Southern Wayne, Eastern Wayne, West Craven, a lot of places before you end up there.

"If we continue to elevate our play each week, who knows where we might end up."

The Golden Falcons were doing a good contender's impression during Friday night's 23-6 win against Goldsboro at Hardy Talton Stadium.

Aycock (3-1, 1-0) won its ECC opener with a bruising defensive effort against the Cougars, running off to an early lead and stopping Goldsboro in its tracks for most of the game. The Cougars (0-4) simply never got going, running up just 91 yards of total offense and only 34 rushing yards by halftime.

The Golden Falcons scored on the opening drive of the game, with quarterback Wesley Whitley hitting a pair of 25-yard passes to get into the end zone. The final pass, a scoring strike to Spruce Lee over the middle, gave Aycock a 7-0 lead after Jon Burke's extra point.

Goldsboro's defense adjusted and tightened up on the Falcons, but Aycock cashed in as Burke ended a drive with a 35-yard field goal and Turner Wood blocked a Goldsboro punt out of the end zone for a safety and a 12-0 lead after one period.

"Turnovers, penalties ... we hurt ourselves," said Goldsboro coach Maurice Jackson. "We can't give them any extra. Special teams, fumbles, turnovers in our own territory ... two field goals and a safety, and all because the offense is not moving the ball. We can't be pleased about giving up 23 points. So we've got work to do."

Burke tacked on another field goal, this time from 25 yards, to move out to a 15-0 lead early in the second period before the game settled into a series of stalled drives and punts. Goldsboro's Kelvin Ingram took a kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown, but the play was wiped out by a penalty. Aycock's defense turned the Cougars away from a short-field situation with no points.

The second half continued the same defensive pattern, with both Goldsboro and Aycock grinding out short drives without a scoring chance. Burke missed a 33-yard field goal try as the quarter ended.

A Cougar fumble that Chris Byrd recovered at the Goldsboro 11 set up Shonte Barnes for an touchdown run, and Cobb ran in the conversion for a 23-0 Falcons lead.

Goldsboro prevented the shutout on defense, as Coriante Thompson scooped up an Aycock fumble and ran 14 yards to score with 4:13 left in the game.

Barnes led the Falcon ground attack with 77 yards on 17 carries, while Whitley ran for 46 yards and passed for 82 more. Thomas Artis made three catches for 57 yards. Goldsboro's Ingram picked up 54 yards on 11 totes.

Defensively, Wood had seven solo tackles for Aycock. Cortez Gilbert had five solos and four assists, while Byrd recovered two fumbles and had four solo tackles and three assists.

Goldsboro's Charles Grantham had eight solo tackles and three assists, with Thompson ending his night with eight solo tackles in addition to the fumble recovery for a score. Elijah Darden had six solo tackles before getting inured and having to be taken to the hospital by ambulance. Darden suffered bruised ribs and will be out of action for two weeks.

Jackson said his team will not hide behind it's youth anymore.

"That's not an excuse. We've got to stop using that ... we've used that enough," he said. "Now it's the fourth ball game, and we've just got to play. We know what we've got to do. We've gone through it in practice. If we can do it in practice, we should do it in a game."

Aycock will take a week off before traveling to county rival Southern Wayne on Sept. 24. Goldsboro entertains three-time defending ECC champion West Craven next Friday.

Goldsboro 0 0 0 6 -- 6

C.B. Aycock 12 3 0 8 -- 23

First quarter

CBA -- Lee 25 pass from Whitley (Burke kick), 9:27

CBA -- Burke 30 FG, 2:41

CBA -- Safety, punt blocked out of end zone, 0:51

Second quarter

CBA -- Burke 25 FG, 10:24

Fourth quarter

CBA -- Barnes 11 run (Cobb run), 8:09

G -- Thompson 14 fumble return (run fail), 4:13

G CBA

First downs 5 14

Rushes-yds 25-22 46-216

Pass yds 69 82

Total yards 91 298

Comp-att-int 4-18-1 4-11-1

Fumbles-lost 3-2 3-3

Penalties-yds 6-50 8-75

Punts-avg. 5-32.6 3-32.6

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING -- Goldsboro -- Kelvin Ingram 11-54; Aaron Phifer 3-10; Jacob Sykes 2-1; Jerry Gills 3-(-8); Treme Boone 6-(35). C.B. Aycock -- Shonte Barnes 17-77, TD; Keith Cobb 7-50; Wesley Whitley 5-46; Dontay Taylor 9-31; Chris Byrd 3-13; Rashawn Allen 2-5; Carlos Dobbins 1-2.

PASSING -- Goldsboro -- Treme Boone 4-16-1-0; Adrian Lewis 0-1-0-0; Kelvin Ingram 0-1-0-0. C.B. Aycock -- Wesley Whitley 4-11-82-1.

RECEIVING -- Goldsboro -- Jacob Sykes 2-49; Kelvin Ingram 1-12; Aaron Phifer 1-8. C.B. Aycock -- Thomas Artis 3-57; Spruce Lee 1-25, TD.