Pinckneyville Halts Winless Skid

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ Despite having to start their third different quarterback of the 2008

season, Pinckneyville rallied and earned their first victory of the year,

knocking off Sparta 40-18 last night at Sparta High School.

"They've got that monkey off their back," said Panthers' head coach Tod

Rushing, referring to this year's senior class that had gone winless as

freshmen and sophomores.

Things didn't look good early, as before the game even started, the Panthers

learned they'd be without starting quarterback Nathan Morton, who had been

hospitalized with an abscessed tooth.

Since the offense had practiced mostly in the T-formation in practice this

week, and Thomas McConnell was most familiar with it, he got the nod to make

his first varsity start at quarterback.

If that wasn't enough, Preston Nance took the game's opening kickoff all the

way to the end zone for a Sparta touchdown, and it was 6-0 after only

fifteen seconds of play.

After Jake Bathon returned the kickoff to the Panthers' 40-yard line,

Jonathan Kuberski and D.J. Keene made runs of seven and nine yards

respectively. That set up Bathon's 44-yard touchdown run, which he followed

up by also putting in the two point conversion that gave the Panthers an 8-6

lead with 10:23 left in the opening quarter.

"I want to give a lot of credit to our offensive line and our offensive line

coaches," said Rushing. "To run the offense we ran tonight, you have to

block, and I thought we did a great job."

Jeff Thorton picked off Bulldogs quarterback Blake Shelton on Sparta's next

drive, which helped set up the Panthers' second score of the night, a

27-yard touchdown pass from McConnell to Taylor Tabing that wobbled it's way

high into the air before falling into Tabing's waiting arms.

The Bulldogs didn't let up, taking advantage of great field position late in

the first quarter after a bad snap on the Panthers' punt attempt.

A fourth down touchdown pass from Shelton to Clay Peck from 17 yards out

closed the gap, as Sparta trailed 14-12.

Pinckneyville would eat up almost ten minutes of clock on their next drive,

a 64-yard trek down the field using nothing but the running game that was

capped off with McConnell running it in from one yard out.

The two-pointer failed, and the Panthers led 20-12 with 3:38 remaining in

the half.

That was the score when Shelton connected with Peck on a 60-yard touchdown

early in the third quarter, but the Bulldogs couldn't tie the game with the

two-point conversion.

Kuberski had a nice return on the kickoff as the Panthers took over on the

Sparta 33-yard line, and the offense didn't take the excellent field

position for granted.

A facemask penalty and a key fourth down conversion by Neil Kellerman set up

a 4-yard touchdown run by Kuberski, putting the Panthers on top 26-18 with

2:14 left in the third.

Dylan Hagene intercepted Shelton after the Bulldogs took over, and the

Panthers once again went to work on the game clock.

McConnell found Dustin Winter in the end zone with an on-target pass on the

first play of the fourth quarter, and would add a touchdown run in the final

minute to assure the victory for Pinckneyville.

"The playoffs for us are over, but I'm never going to quit, that's not my

nature," said Rushing. "I told them 'we're going to start over, we've got a

4-game season, we're going to try to get these seniors some wins, but we

also feel like we've got some underclassmen coming that can get this program

going and get us back to the playoffs."

The Panthers (1-5, 1-2) host Chester next Friday for Homecoming with kickoff

at 7:00 p.m.