Rayne beats North Vermilion

MAURICE — The North Vermilion Patriots started and ended their Acadia-Vermilion Jamboree game against Rayne with a bang, scoring on the opening kickoff and the game’s final play.
“It’s a learning experience,” first-year head coach Joe Heintz said. “Everything’s a learning experience.”
In between, though, North Vermilion made a few mistakes that must be cleaned up, Heintz said. Rayne scored 22 straight points after giving up the opening touchdown before the Patriots scored again in a 22-12 loss.
“Positives, I thought we started eliminating some of the penalties, and we started moving the ball a little bit,” Heintz said. “And then, obviously, we committed way too many penalties in the first half.”
The game was rough on both sides as the teams combined for 11 penalties totaling 90 yards and marched off in the first half (five for 45 against NVHS, six for 45 against Rayne).
There was even a streak of five straight snaps with penalties at one point. The penalty total didn’t include a declined penalty against NVHS and offsetting penalties against both squads.
But the Patriots didn’t get flagged in the second half, while Rayne was whistled five times for 40 yards in penalties.
Norris Benoit got the scoring going when he returned the opening kickoff 88 yards for a TD.
The Patriots stopped Rayne’s opening drive and forced a punt, but a fumble two snaps later gave the Wolves possession at the NV 35, setting up a game-tying 17-yard touchdown run by Kylin Wheeler.
That was the first of seven fumbles by the Patriots, three of them recovered by Rayne.
The Wolves added a 58-yard touchdown pass from Dylan Judice to Wheeler and a nine-yard TD run by Wheeler for a 22-6 lead.
A saving grace for the Patriots was a pair of interceptions by James Higginbotham and Brody Lambeck, and a fumble recovery by the Patriots to set up the final score, a 51-yard quarterback keeper by Logan Thompson as time expired.
“We’re going to watch film and come back Monday to make some corrections on our mistakes,” Heintz said. “I thought effort-wise we were good. You can’t make mistakes where you’re getting penalized. That’s where we lost the game, I thought.”
North Vermilion finished with 125 rushing yards. Five players carried the ball for the Patriots, with Thompson’s big run propelling him to a team-high 62 yards on six carries.
Tucker Denais had 37 yards on a team-high eight carries. Grant Wise added 33 yards on four carries.
Andrew Heintz, Devin Galley and Heath Aubrey also had carries for positive yards for the Patriots.
North Vermilion starts the season against three straight Vermilion Parish foes. NV opens the regular season on Friday at home against Kaplan, then travels to Erath and Abbeville for the next two weeks.