FLATONIA — Bulldogs football went down to Nixon-Smiley High School Sept. 13 at Bulldogs Field in Flatonia by a final score of 43-14.
A close first half led to Nix - on-Smiley taking over the sec - ond half with their run game while holding Flatonia scoreless for the entire half.
“We put them on the sched- ule because they run similar to Weimar," said Flatonia head football coach Brent Mascheck. "That's one of the reasons why we schedule them because they run an offense very similar to what Weimar does. It's a very tough offense to prepare for be - cause of the way they run it and the physicality and stuff like that.
We got to get better defensively and I can’t put all the blame on the defense. Offensively, we have got to be able to move the ball, continue drives, finish drives, and things like that. We're not playing very efficient football on the of - fensive side. Our nemesis again, we missed too many tackles on the defensive side. Came back to haunt us again. They really played a great game and you got to give credit to Nixon-Smiley." Flatonia put on the first score of the game with a recovered fumble for a touchdown by se - nior defensive back Keegan Green about midway through the first quarter for a 7-0 lead. Nixon answered right back two minutes later with their run game and scored on a quarterback keeper from sophomore Eric Rodriguez, then converted a two-point try on another quarterback keeper to make it 8-7. The Mustangs continued to ap - ply pressure with their run game and scored again on a rushing touchdown from 11 yards out to go ahead 14-7 in the final sec - onds of the quarter after a failed fake field goal attempt.
Nixon didn't score again un - til the three minute mark in the second quarter on a botched punt snap from Flatonia from the Bulldogs 11-yard line to put it at 22-7. A nice running drive from the Bulldogs in response led to a 4-yard touchdown from quarter -
back Beck Zimmerman with 17 seconds to go in the quarter, put - ting it at 22-14 in favor of Nixon going into halftime.
Flatonia didn't score for the rest of the game while Nixon put up two touchdowns in the third quarter, one at the 7:16 mark and one at the 33 second mark, both on runs to make it 36-14.
The Mustangs iced the game in the fourth quarter by convert -
ing on a two-yard touchdown run with 9:37 to go after running the
ball down to the Flatonia goal line, which led to a quiet rest of the quarter en route to a 43-14 win for Nixon.
