Faith Academy football wins home opener against Runge

CAPTION: Faith Academy head coach Jay Silvers congratulates the Flames on earning their first win of the season. Staff photo by Jennifer Fierro

The Faith Academy of Marble Falls football team crushed the Runge Yellowjackets 82-32 in the Flames’ home opener Sept. 6.

The game ended after two quarters. To celebrate, a couple of Flames emptied the Gatorade water dispenser on head coach Jay Silvers. They gave him his first victory as a head coach in his career.

“It feels great to get that monkey off my back,” he said. “The boys played well tonight. I’m excited for them. Offensively, they were firing on all cylinders. They were hitting their passes like they were supposed to.”

Offensively, the Flames (1-1) were balanced. They had 16 carries for 224 yards and connected on 7 of 10 passes for 252 yards for 476 yards of total offense and 11 touchdowns.

Junior quarterback Andrew Houy had three rushes for 99 yards and three touchdowns and completed 5 of 7 passes for 165 yards and 3 scores. He also caught a 45-yard touchdown pass from senior athlete Carter Fromberg.

“It just came down to getting the reps in and practice and keep listening to our coaches and what they have to say and just hitting our reads,” Houy said.

Fromberg had five carries for 35 yards including a five-yard touchdown run, completed both of his passes for 87 yards, and caught a 38-yard touchdown pass from Houy. Freshman Landon Silvers had 6 rushes for 79 yards and three touchdowns, while junior Beau Steele had 2 carries for 11 yards and a six-yard touchdown and junior Adam Merlick caught a 14-yard touchdown pass.

“Drew did a great job tonight,” the coach said. “I thought Carter played all-around really hard tonight. It was fun to watch. And Landon did a great job and he made his runs. He’s very shifty, and he moves side to side really well.”

Fromberg, Houy and Landon Silvers each spent time at quarterback.

“We just have a three-headed beast sitting back there, and I can rotate them,” Jay Silvers said. “They all went into different spots in the backfield, and they can all do everything back there and fortunately, I’m lucky I have that. That’s definitely a perk for us; we don’t have to rely on one person just to throw the ball. They all can run, they can all throw. I see something, so whoever’s back there, I trust we’re going to throw it right.” 

The Yellowjackets and the Flames matched each other touchdown for touchdown to start the contest. With Faith leading 24-12 midway through the first quarter, the Flames recovered a fumble to set up Landon Silvers’ first touchdown run of six yards.

Steele recovered a fumble on the Faith 17-yard line that led to Landon Silvers’ 29-yard touchdown run. Sophomore Price Rosamond caught an interception on the Faith 13-yard line that led to Houy completing the 57-yard touchdown pass to Merlick.

“It took a minute,” the coach said of his defense. “We got it, we took care of it, and they started playing together as a team and started communicating and figuring it out. That’s not a slouch team. They’ve got some athletes over there that are hard to cover. After the first quarter, we started to make our presence known defensively. The entire game we tackled really well, but they all flew to the ball. It was a swarm of Flames getting to the ball carrier, and that’s what we love to see is four or five of them. ” 

Runge’s Jose Mendoza, who led the Yellowjackets with 14 rushes for 127 yards and two touchdowns. He also had a 40-yard kickoff return for a score.

“He’s a handful and we knew that,” Silvers said. “Our game plan was going to be to wear him out because he does play both ways. Offensively, we attacked him with our blockers and made him chase our guys and defensively, we just made sure somebody’s on him. We feel like (the game plan) worked out like we it wanted to. We made our mistakes and we got some things to learn from this game and fix before next week.” 

The Flames will travel to play at Fredericksburg Heritage Friday, Sept. 13, at 7:30 p.m.

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