MONTICELLO - When new Rison Coach Caleb Carmikle was asked about "the good, the bad and the ugly"of his first-ever Wildcat scrimmage game Tuesday night, he was quick to answer - "I thought there was a lot of all of it." Rison made the trip down to Monticello on what was an unusually pleasant evening for August to scrimmage the Class 4A Billies. The first two quarters were played in a regular game situation without live kicks. In the second half, each team ran eight offensive plays each for the third quarter before a 10-minute running clock was used for the fourth quarter. Both used mostly reserves in the final portion of the scrimmage.
Monticello won the first half by a 19-12 margin before adding a couple of more scores in the second half.
It didn't take long to recognize there has been a coaching change at Rison. In stark contrast to the groundand-pound the Wildcats used for 25 years under former Coach Clay Totty in his veer offense, Rison quarterback Owen Morrison thew it 21 times in the first half alone as he completed 10 passes for 224 yards with one touchdown and one interception. That lone pick came in the end zone on a Hail Mary to end the first half.
Morrison also scored on a three-yard quarterback sneak.
Morrison's touchdown pass came on a nice 43-yard connection with running back Treyvion Wainwright that gave Rison a 126 lead at the time. Meanwhile, ZaKyler Walker finished the first half with four catches for 124 yards. In addition, Keyshawn Heard had two receptions for 31 yards, Aaron Tilley one for 13, Eli Turner one for 10 and Erion McCraney one for 3.
Wainright was Rison's leading rusher in the first half with 32 yards on eight attempts. "I thought offensively we had some big plays, but we struggled to sustain drives at time," Carmikle said. "Sometimes we would go down into scoring position but couldn't finish it out. But I thought, overall, it wasn't bad." While Rison did make some big plays with th...
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