Zachary jumps out early, rides explosive offense to win at Central

CENTRAL – Friday night at Wildcat Stadium, the Zachary Broncos had the better of an impressive display by the offenses in a 55-35 victory over Central.

Senior quarterback Keilon Brown piled up 433 total yards and six touchdowns to fuel the win by the reigning Class 5A champions. Brown rushed 13 times for 126 yards with three touchdowns and completed 16 for 21 for 307 yards with three scores.

Zachary (7-2 4-0) punted on their opening drive before notching touchdowns on their following seven possessions and eight of ten total drives on the night.

“I’ve been waiting to see that offensively for a while,” Zachary head coach David Brewerton said. “I think the offensive staff had a great game plan, where the line felt comfortable. Our quarterback felt comfortable, and I thought we played really well upfront. I’ve been waiting for those guys to come together and I thought we did tonight.”

A 14-yard quarterback keeper by Brown put Zachary up 27-14 with just 17 seconds in the first half, and Central never got closer than that again.

The Broncos extended the lead to 20 on the opening drive of the second half with a 51-yard toss from Brown to Kenson Tate.

Central quarterback Sam Kennerson kept the game within reach with a pair second half scores on runs of 7 and 42 yards respectively. However, a 52-yard strike from Brown to Chris Hinton made it 48-28 and all but locked up the impressive road win for Zachary.

Isaiah Rankins trimmed the Broncos’ lead back to 13 before R.J. Allen put the explanation mark on the game with 48-yard score for the final points of a game full of explosive plays.

“They are a dynamic football team and they did some things to hurt us,” said Central head coach Sid Edwards. “We tried our best to hang on. We’ve got to get in the film room and identify some points that were not good.”

Brown scored the first points of the contest on a six-yard run with 4:44 to play in the first period. Allen’s 10 yard runs gave the Broncos a 13-0 advantage.

Central’s Jonathan Swift II scored on a 13 yard run to open the scoring for the hosts butJaelon Crear took a screen pass down to the Wildcats’ 25 yard line to set up a three-yard Brown keeper that made it 20-7 Broncos.

Isiah Rannkins raced 70 yards for a touchdown to draw Central (7-2 2-2) close again at 20-14 but Zachary always had a timely answer.