North Buncombe – Just before their season began, North Buncombe Head Coach Brandon Allen dropped his team and headed home to Haywood County, saying he wanted to spend more time with his family.
Allen left a message for readers in the Tribune, “The kids are ready. They’ve got a great group of young men who’ve been working extremely hard all summer. They have an amazing staff that’s in place that’s eager and ready to go.”
Reeling from the loss of their head coach right before their season started, the North Buncombe High School Varsity football team has yet to find their footing. The team lost their first two games by more than 20 points each.
The first loss came at home in the annual “Jug” contest against the Madison County Patriots. Madison, winless last season, secured a 47-24 win over the Black Hawks and a right to claim the “Jug” for the first time in years.
The second was an away game against the Andrew Wildcats, who left with a 44-20 win over North Buncombe. The Wildcats held the Hawks scoreless in the first half with a 28-0 lead. North Buncombe scored 20 points in the second on a Gabe Banks 1 yard run at the 5:45 mark in the third and a Banks 44-yard pass to Spencer Roane for a touch down in the third with 1:33 left in the quarter. Both two-point attempts by Banks would fail.
The Banks/Roane combination was good for one more touchdown in the fourth, and Banks would finally run one in for an additional two points, while the Wildcats racked up 16 points in the third quarter and none in the fourth.
Securing a “W.”
North Buncombe knows how to score and, at times, they know how to offer a tough defense, but can they put together enough of both to put one in the “W” column? The saving grace so far is that both losses are non-conference games that will not count against their conference standing and will hopefully be a learning process for the team.