The562’s coverage of Jordan Athletics is sponsored by former LBUSD superintendent Chris Steinhauser.
The dream start to a new era of Jordan football will have to wait. Expectations were high when the Panthers debuted their brand new stadium in their season opener under new head coach Alfred Rowe on Thursday night, but they couldn’t keep up with visiting Crenshaw, plagued by early miscues and miscommunication in a 32-24 loss.
“It’s disappointing for the North. I’m sorry to the North that we opened the stadium like this,” Rowe said after the game. “That wasn’t the standard of effort that we want. There were a lot of mental mistakes and I think we beat ourselves tonight, and that’s on me. I need to fix it and we won’t have this problem again.”
If there were any positives for Jordan to take from Friday night, running back Marcus Williams was certainly one of them. The senior scored the first touchdown on Jordan’s brand new field, finding the end zone from five yards out in the first quarter to put Jordan up 6-0. Williams finished the night with 159 rushing yards, two touchdowns, and six catches for 54 yards.
“[Williams] is our guy. He’s a great kid and that’s why he was our only captain out there,” Rowe said of Williams. “He went out there and played his ass off, man. It hurts that we couldn’t get him a win in his last first game but he played his ass off and we’re going to lean on him a lot all season.”
After that seven-play touchdown drive in the first quarter, the Panthers’ following drives ended with a turnover on downs and two punts before they fumbled the ball on the opening kickoff of the second half. Rowe decided to make changes at quarterback during the dry spell, and says it’ll continue to be a competition between Sama’jay Jackson and Ashton Bradley.
“I think we made a decision a little too soon,” Rowe said of naming a designated QB. “I’m always going to play the best guy because I want to win, so whoever is going to be our best guy moving forward will be the one to go.”
Crenshaw went on to score the next 20 points, all at the hands of quarterback Danniel Flowers. Flowers hit De’Andre Kirkpatrick in stride for a 54-yard score, before finding Kyion Rattler before the half. Flowers then connected with Kirkpatrick after a Jordan fumble to open the third quarter to give the Cougars a two-score lead.
Jordan made several pushes at a comeback in the second half and found some success after going into a tempo offense. In the third quarter, the Panthers put together a 12-play four minute drive to cut the lead to a touchdown. Williams touched the ball eight times on that drive before scoring from 10 yards out.
Crenshaw replied with a touchdown rush on its next drive by Flowers, before another well put together drive from Jordan. The Panthers answered with an eight play drive in just three minutes to cut the lead to one score once again. They trailed 26-18 midway through the fourth quarter.
Jordan had its opportunity to tie the ballgame after an interception on the second play of Crenshaw’s ensuing drive. The Panthers then drove downfield before facing 4th-and-8 from the Crenshaw nine-yard line. Instead of going for the touchdown and potentially tying the game on a two-point conversion, Rowe elected to kick a field goal—one that would end up blocked and recovered by Crenshaw.
“I think I just wanted to get the points,” Rowe said of the decision. “We were playing really good on defense. It wasn’t like we were just getting killed on defense, a lot of it was just our own mistakes. They weren’t running the ball down our throat, and we were playing really well on defense. I just thought we could get the points, get the ball back, and try to score again.”
Crenshaw added a touchdown two drives later on short rush from Flowers to go up by two scores again. Flowers finished the game with 227 passing yards and five total touchdowns.
Jordan was able to find the endzone one more time on its final drive with a 74-yard strike to Kymani Hill from Ashton Bradley.
The Panthers will look to rebound next week when they visit La Canada.
