Nocona
The Nocona Indians opened district play on Friday with likely their biggest challenge all year as they traveled to state powerhouse Gunter.
The Tigers have won and have been runner’s up for the state title the past two seasons, with this year expected to be no different. It showed as they beat the Indians 49-0.
Despite the one-sided score, under the circumstances Coach Brad Keck was proud with how his team held up.
“Truthfully, I thought we gave a good effort,” Keck said. “Our kids played hard. I’m telling you, Gunter is just that good. They are just so fast. Their team speed is just unbelievable. We knew that heading into the game, but you really don’t feel it until you see it live.”
The fastest person on the field for the Tigers was Dylan Jantz, who scored six touchdowns and totaled 247 yards on only 12 touches.
Despite all of that, Keck said he saw his team fighting to the bitter end despite being outmatched, something he was glad to see since the final result could have been more than it was ugly. It was one of those games where going through the game film is not even worth it.
With the toughest challenge out of the way, Nocona feels like they have a good chance this week against Henrietta to pick up their first district win. The Indians play at 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 5 at Henrietta.

Gold-Burg
The Gold-Burg Bears had another potential win slip through their fingers Friday night as they lost at Northside. It was a relatively low scoring game for six-man as the Indians won 28-19 in a game that featured no scoring in the first half by either team.
The Bears had their chances. Two interceptions thrown inside Northside’s red zone and one dropped touchdown pass kept Gold-Burg out of the end zone, but their defense responded to each set back by stepping up to keep the game tied.
As both teams traded scores in the second half, the Bears found themselves trailing 22-19 late in the fourth quarter.
On a fourth and five with more than two minutes to go and all of their timeouts left, Gold-Burg had to hold the Indians to get the ball back for a chance to take the lead.
“We’ve got the guy boggled up in the backfield and somehow he snuck out of there,” Coach Gordon Williams said. “We had two guys with their hands on him and somehow he wiggled out and got five and half yards.”
Northside would go on to score on that drive to make it a two score game 28-19 and that is where the game ended. They play their first division II school this week against Woodson for their homecoming game and Williams feels good about his team’s chances. Homecoming activities are scheduled to start at 7 p.m.
An Air Evac helicopter will deliver the game ball at about 7:25 p.m. to help kickoff the game.

Forestburg
The Forestburg Longhorns are still searching for their first win after hosting Newcastle at home Friday night.
The bigger division I team was able to stop the Longhorns from doing what they wanted to do early on while they struggled to get many stops from their defense as the Bobcats won 70-13.
“Offensively we played decent,” Coach Kyler Roach said. “They did a good job at stopping the run out of our I-formation. They also did a good job at defending our spread offense.” The challenging opponents do not stop coming as the Longhorns play Savoy at 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 5 on the road.