Bucs thrash Bulldogs 40-0 for seventh straight win in series.
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Branford receiver Austin Malaguti runs past a Bell defender Saturday night during the Buccaneers’ 40-0 win. (ERIN ROBERTS/Special to the Reporter)
BRANFORD – A MedEvac-sponsored helicopter landed 15 minutes before game time at Cleve Sikes Field to deliver a ceremonial game ball at the 50-yard line.
Branford then proceeded to deliver another dominating effort against neighboring rival Bell.
Even after the limited practices and cancellation of last week’s game caused by Hurricane Idalia, the Bucs resumed their stranglehold of their series against the winless Bulldogs in a 40-0 thrashing Saturday night.
Branford (2-0) has now won seven in a row against Bell (0-3).
"It means a lot," said senior receiver Austin Malaguti, referring to his team's recent dominance over the rival from Gilchrist County. He leads the team with five touchdowns after scoring two against Bell.
"When (Bell) gets off the bus, they look just like us. They're not way bigger than us. We look the same. At the roots, we're just coached better."
The Bucs proved to be quick off the gate, as well. Just one minute into the game, Branford had the first of five takeaways when Adrian Herrera picked off a Bell pass in the game's opening series.
Just three plays later, Thomas Sikes threw a short pass to Malaguti that became an 81-yard touchdown score for a 6-0 BHS lead three minutes into the game. The Bucs never looked back after that, leading 26-0 at halftime.
The fourth quarter was played with a running clock when the Bucs scored the game's final points on Sike's 21-yard TD pass to Colby Carver on the final play of the third quarter.
Branford went on to outgain Bell by a 338-66 margin in total yardage.
Sikes, a sophomore, completed 12 of 20 passes for 223 yards, with two touchdowns and one interception. Sikes also accounted for another score on a 3-yard run.
"I'm excited to see him in the future," Malaguti said of his young signal caller. "When I graduate, I'm going to come back and watch him, and see what he can do. I'm excited for his future."
Malaguti finished with three receptions for 95 yards, and contributed another touchdown on a 6-yard run. Along with his pick, Herrera also had three receptions for 68 yards. Carver had two catches for 33 yards. Trevor Maddox led all rushers with 58 yards on six carries for a 9.7 yards per carry average. He also had a 29-yard TD run.
Not to be outdone by the offense, the defense gave up 42 rushing yards on 31 carries for a miniscule 1.4-yard average per attempt.
The Bucs also forced five turnovers, with the secondary picking off five Bell passes. Arkayvion Jones had two picks, and Kyshaun Veasy had one that he ran back 63 yards for a touchdown. Linebacker Andres Maysonet had the other takeaway on a fumble recovery.
"You have to have a good pass rush, and be sound on the back end," Bucs coach Tim Clark said, referring to the high frequency of takeaways by his defense. "Veasey's pick-6, that was a great aggressive break out in the middle of the field. He covered a lot of ground; he came over from his free safety position. The others were underthrown balls; we teach (the DB's) to go up and compete for the football and they did tonight."
With the exception of penalties (seven for 70 yards), one of which negated a long rushing touchdown, the one-sided matchup was a tuneup the Bucs needed with Hilliard next visiting on Friday.
Hilliard (1-1) is a perennial playoff team which was 8-3 last season.
"There's still things we need to work on, including the penalties," Clark said. "We put the ball on the ground twice and lost it once, we threw a pick, and we let them convert a fourth down on a fake punt.
"Obviously, we didn't break. We were able to overcome that stuff. I'd say it might be a little bit of rust from the time off . . . but those are the type of things we can't have going against a team like Hilliard. We're going to have the best practices we've had."