Mansfield Lake Ridge stuns cross-town rival and state ranked Mansfield Summit in opener

Mansfield Summit coach Channon Hall prides himself on having a tough, solid defense.

With junior defensive end Legend Journey, last season’s all-area defensive newcomer of the year, to anchor his unit the Jaguars were hopeful to continue their recent success of reaching two consecutive state semifinals.

But cross-town rival Mansfield Lake Ridge didn’t get the memo.

The Class 6A Eagles scored on six of their eight first-half drives to thump Class 5A Division 2 No. 5 Summit, 50-27, on Friday night at Newsom Stadium in the season opener for both schools.

It looked like it was going to be a track meet after 21 points were scored in the first 3:02 of the game, all on big plays.

Raycine Guillory had a 61-yard scoring run to open the game for Lake Ridge, Summit quarterback Joseph Williams countered with a 67-yard TD run and the Eagle’s Jamaal Hall hauled in a 74-yard scoring pass from Kennen Miller to give Lake Ridge a 14-7 lead with 8:58 left in the first quarter.

But Lake Ridge (1-0) started to play a little defense of its own, despite not having senior safety Corey Thompson, who is No. 79 in the Star-Telegram Top 100 players.

The Eagles forced Summit (0-1) to punt four times and forced a turnover on the Jaguars next five series.

“We didn’t play with the same tenacity that we needed to,” said Hall. “We got down and it hit people the wrong way. We have to learn how to bounce back. We just want everybody to fight and that’s what we’re about win, lose or draw.”

Lake Ridge coach Kirk Thor would only say that Thompson is “recovering from an injury,” and declined to elaborate.

“I thought that our defense played really aggressively,” said Thor. “We’re getting back to where we have been in the past aggressively and mentality wise. Really our guys are just playing for each other and it’s fun to watch.”

While the defense was dominating, Miller was adding to the Eagles’ lead with a 1-yard run and touchdown passes of 10 and 4 yards, respectively, to Bryce Marcus and Tanner Grimes. The latter gave Lake Ridge a 36-7 lead with 7:40 left in the second quarter.

“Summit does have a really good defense, but I just have a lot of trust in my receivers and I know that they can compete with anybody,” said Miller, a sophomore, who completed 14 of 23 passes for 232 yards and three TDs. “Our offensive line did a really good job. They have a good team on both sides of the ball, but I feel like that we just came out and executed.”

Summit finally scored again on a 2-yard run by Williams, but Hall took the ensuing kickoff back 79 yards to put the Eagles up 42-14 at intermission.

Williams has some big shoes to fill at quarterback after the departure of David Hopkins Jr., who led Summit to the two state semifinal appearances. The junior struggled through the air completing 6 of 24 passes for 102 yards, but did have 179 rushing yards on 15 carries and three touchdowns.

Guillory scored his second TD on a 2-yard run with 7:44 left in the third quarter that put Lake Ridge up 50-14, allowing Thor to substitute liberally.

Lake Ridge has now won six of the last seven meetings between the two schools after Summit won the first three games after the Eagles’ program started.

Journey, No. 28 in the S-T Top 100, already holds eight offers including TCU, SMU, Texas Tech, Houston, Oklahoma State and Ole Miss.

This story was originally published August 26, 2022 at 10:17 PM.