Kristina Lloyd – Lincoln senior Kevin Mathews gets ready to snap the ball during the Lynx shutout win over Lake Mead last Friday. The team looks to punch its ticket to the state title game in a semifinal matchup against Yerington tomorrow at noon.
The Lincoln County High School football team plowed through Lake Mead in Panaca last Friday on its way to the state 2A semifinals.
Lincoln’s defense did what it has done several times this season, holding the opponent scoreless. This time the final score was 45-0, keeping the Lynx undefeated on the year.
Lynx coach Rich Ottley said, “Lake Mead has improved alot over the season. I did not expect to shut them out.”
The first quarter was slow, and the only points scored was a 28-yard field goal by Lincoln’s Aldo Tiberio.
But the Lynx offense picked it up in the second quarter with three rushing touchdowns, two by Zach Rowe and an explosive 54-yard run by Cody Thornock.
Ottley said, “I was really impressed with Cody Thornock and Zach Rowe’s offense and Kamdon Lewis and McKinley O’Connor’s defense.”
In the third quarter, Landon Smith caught a 34-yard pass from Thornock for a touchdown. In the fourth quarter Smith scored two touchdowns and intercepted a pass. Coach Ottley told NevadaPreps.com, “Landon is a great all-purpose guy. Defensively, he’s great in pass coverage. He’s really fast — the fastest kid on our track team. And he’s such a dual-threat with rushing and catching passes.”
Smith leads the Lynx team in rushing, receiving, scoring and interceptions.
The semifinal game is a rematch with the Yerington Lions tomorrow in Panaca at noon. Yerington was undefeated last season and took Lincoln down in the 2015 state title game.
But the Lions are a different team this year after losing two-time MVP Reese Neville and long-time head coach Cody Neville. This year’s team group heavily on its running game, with a talented string of running backs led by Michael Monahan. According to MaxPreps.com, the junior has 1,103 yards for the season on 93 carries, an average of 11.9 yards per carry. The team averages 327 yards per game on the ground and not much through the air.
The Lions are 7-1 overall and 4-1 in league play and entered the playoffs as the north’s two seed.
The team lost an overtime game at Pershing County 20-14 in October. Pershing (6-0, 4-0) plays southern two seed Needles in the other semifinal matchup tomorrow at 1 p.m. in Lovelock.
The state title game will be Nov. 19 at Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas.
