No. 10 Fairview football rolls past Doherty
COLORADO SPRINGS — Fairview arrived as a top-10 Class 5A football team on Friday night, and showed why in its win over Doherty.
The Knights, ranked No. 10, won 54-21.
Fairview wasn’t fazed by a raucous crowd as they jumped out to a 7-0 lead on the first drive of the game. Fairview tacked on another touchdown with three minutes left in the quarter before a Doherty touchdown courtesy of senior Brandon Becker closed out the first.
The floodgates blew open in the second for Fairview, with the Knights reaching the endzone four times before the end of the half.
Fairview recovered a Doherty fumble with eight minutes left in the second and the ensuing drive resulted in a touchdown run from junior Dillon Tarves.
Senior quarterback and Northwestern commit Aidan Atkinson showcased his throwing ability, hitting sophomore wideout Grant Page for a 40-yard pass. The drive was capped off by another pass to Page in the endzone with 6:08 left in the half. Not to be outdone, Tarves got open on numerous flat routes and picked up big yardage.
Doherty was able to get within two yards of the endzone, but a fumble gave the ball back to Fairview. One 60-yard pass and a few penalties later, Atkinson found Tarves once again to make it 40-7 Spartans right before the half ended.
“It’s up to the quarterback to get the guys in the right situations and the right plays,” said Atkinson. “(But) without the O-line doing their job and without having capable receivers all around myself, none of that is possible so our O-line did an incredible job tonight.”
Doherty scored just two minutes into the third, but Fairview answered right back with a touchdown on the ensuing kickoff courtesy of Tarves.
The latter half of the game was capped off by two touchdown runs, with each team getting one apiece. After that, it was a just a matter of the clock running down.
“We always got to improve by doing the small things,” Doherty coach Dwight Hale said. “Right now, we’re not doing the small things right for four quarters and it’s showing on the scoreboard and it’s showing in our play. On top of that, we’ve got to make sure we play the way we practice.”
