Middle Creek rallies past Wakefield to win, 45-31, in Ragland’s debut

Randy Ragland’s debut as Middle Creek’s head coach got off to a rocky start, but the Mustangs overcame plenty of opening-game penalties and mistakes to rally past Wakefield, 45-31.

Wakefield was able to take advantage early and led 18-3 and 24-10 in the first half before the Mustangs turned things around and scored the next 35 points.

Turning point

Trailing by two touchdowns, 24-10, as Wakefield took advantage of Mustangs’ errors, Middle Creek’s Shammond Hicks returned a kickoff 84 yards for a touchdown to cut the lead to 24-17.

From that point on Middle Creek took advantage of the Wolverines’ miscues to tie the game by halftime and pull away in the second half.

3 who mattered

Matt McKay, Wakefield: Threw for over 400 yards and ran for over 100 in the loss, but also threw five interceptions.

Dominique Shoffner, Middle Creek: Got the nod as the starter at quarterback for the Mustangs. The junior threw three touchdown passes for 288 yards.

Shammond Hicks, Middle Creek: Returned a kickoff 84 yards for a touchdown and scored again on an 86-yard pass reception

By the numbers

3: Interceptions by Middle Creek safety Daniel Jackson. Jackson also had a fumble recovery.

4: Scoring plays of 75 yards or longer in the game. Hicks had two of them. Wakefield’s Marius Cooper caught an 80-yard touchdown pass from McKay and Jackson returned one of his interceptions 75 yards for another TD.

5: Straight touchdowns by the Mustangs to pull away from midway the second period to early in the fourth period.

This story was originally published August 21, 2015 at 10:42 PM with the headline "Middle Creek rallies past Wakefield to win, 45-31, in Ragland’s debut."