THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Permian High School Athletics

The Permian Panthers didn’t get to do everything they wanted Friday in their preseason scrimmage with Lubbock-Cooper, but they did quite a bit before the weather intervened. “As far as having a foundation, having a place to start from, we’re going to be better,” Permian interim coach Jeff Ellison said. “We should be better next week than we were this week. And we should be better the week after that. “We’re focused on ourselves, trying to get better each and every day.” Lightning brought an early end to the proceedings at Ratliff Stadium midway through the live quarter. The Panthers were facing third-and-7 at the Pirates 20-yard line when officials halted the action. Minutes later, it was announced that the scrimmage would not resume. “There were a couple of special team’s things we didn’t get done, but other than that we got everything we needed to see,” Ellison said. Before that, the Panthers were in control most of the evening. Ed Williams and Mark Samaniego ran for touchdowns and Justin Hammond scored on a pass from Christian Rodriguez, while Cooper was held out of the end zone all night. Ellison noted the effort of the Permian defense, which held Cooper to 117 total yards and eight first downs. The Panthers had four sacks and cornerback Rakeeb Adeyemi intercepted a pass. “They were flying around, doing a great job,” Ellison said. “I think we dropped off a little bit there later on. “We had some mistakes that we can’t make on defense, and then we had some mistakes on offense that we’ve got to clean up. But we’ve got a place to start from now.” Offensively, Permian finished with 409 total yards and 18 first downs. Williams, who rushed for 93 yards on 11 carries, capped the opening series with a 5-yard touchdown run. Rodriguez, who was 3 of 6 passing for 33 yards, connected with Hammond for a 17-yard scoring pass during a brief stint with the first offense. Starting quarterback Peyton Powell rushed for 75 yards on five carries, breaking off runs of 48 and 16 yards to set up Williams’ TD. Samaniego led the Panthers with 112 yards on six carries, including a 65-yard scoring burst one play after he converted on fourth-and-2 from the Permian 33. Hammond caught two passes for 25 yards and rushed three times for 24 yards. He also took four snaps at quarterback before play was stopped. Ellison said the offense had a chance to adjust to different looks from the Cooper defense. “(Offensive coordinator Thad) Fortune does a great job with making adjustments with whatever we need to do,” Ellison said, “but just with our kids, (it was about) getting back into playing game speed 6A football.” Cooper’s starting offense was kept under wraps much of the night, getting stopped on third down three times in a row before picking up a first down on its first series. The unit never crossed midfield against Permian’s first defense. The Pirates’ best scoring opportunity came from its second offense, which moved 71 yards in seven plays for a first down at the Permian 4-yard line. The next three plays lost yardage and on fourth down, Permian linebacker Logan Phillips broke through to sack Cooper quarterback Rilee Keane. Cooper’s starting quarterback, Brenden Mehl, finished 8 of 19 passing for 56 yards. Running back Robert Mott had 44 yards on four carries for the second offense. In the live quarter, the Pirates went three-and-out on two possessions, the second of which started at their 2-yard line after Carson Roberts' 47-yard punt. Williams had runs of 16 and 8 yards to get the Panthers in the red zone when lightning became a factor.

THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Permian High School Athletics

PERMIAN HOLDS SWAY IN SCRIMMAGE

SAM WALLER

Odessa American | 8/24/2018

PHOTO CREDIT: Jacob Ford