After two straight wins on the road, the Chargers were finally home and looking to close out non-district play at 3-0 with a win over Laredo Alexander at Boerne ISD Stadium, but the Bulldogs had other ideas.
Alexander scored the final 15 points of the contest and recorded the 35-28 victory to leave the Chargers at 2-1 to end the non-district portion of their schedule.
Champion coach Blane Ellis said they didn’t close out non-district the way they wanted but added that it’s time to move on. The Chargers open district play Friday at home against defending 5A-DI state champions Smithson Valley.
“One of our goals is to win the home opener every year and we didn’t do that,” he said. “We let (Alexander) hang around and gave them hope, but at this point it’s time to flush it and move on.”
Ellis said his team is excited to see how they match up with the Rangers.
“We love the challenge of facing them,” he said. “We know we have to play at a high level and execute against them.”
Ellis said one of the reasons they lost to Alexander was because of their lack of consistency. The Chargers tallied 14 points in the first quarter and scored 14 more in the third but were kept off the board in the second and fourth quarters, while the Bulldogs registered points in all four stanzas.
“We’ve got to win first downs, on the drives where we had a lot of success we did well on first downs,” he said.
Ellis added that he was frustrated by unnecessary miscues.
“We have to cut out the boneheaded mistakes. We had some self-inflicted penalties and one of them allowed (Alexander) to extend a drive and score, it was frustrating,” he said. “It was the right call too, but it was a costly penalty. Those types of things caught up with us and we have to clean some of that up.”
While the Rangers graduated 12 starters from their championship team, including nine starters on offense, they’re still picked to win the 13-5A DII district title this year, and Ellis said that doesn’t surprise him.
“They are who they are, they’re always well coached and play physical,” he said. “They’re a quality opponent, who has won a state title.”
The Chargers had a few defensive breakdowns in their secondary that allowed the Bulldogs to hit passing touchdowns of 43 and 71 yards and Ellis said they need to fix it or a team like the Rangers will take advantage.
“There was a little bit of confusion on those plays, so we challenged the coaches to simplify things,” he said. “We want to be detail oriented.”
Champion defenders Ethan Jensen (34) and Brooks Koronczok (45) and others, work to bring down a Laredo Alexander ball carrier in last Friday’s game at Boerne ISD Stadium.
Star photo by Chris Tilton
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