2004 Cedar Park Timberwolf Football

Game-by-Game Narratives - 2004

Week Two: Hays
Friday, September 10th

The team Cedar Park faced in an effort to even their 2004 record was a tough one. The Hays Rebels clearly recalled their stinging home defeat at the hands of the Timberwolves the previous season, and the team was picked by many to win Austin’s district 16-5A title, even over perennial champ Westlake. Indeed, in 2003, the Rebs had gone on to beat Westlake just two games after losing to Cedar Park.

But this time Rebel quarterback Ryan Kimbro and running back Chris Moore laid another solid defeat on the T’wolves, this one 31-17, despite a good performance by Cedar Park in which it suffered no turnovers and the fewest number of penalties (three) in school history.

Tyler Farst had four catches for forty yards. Zac Landry gave the team a lift with a 101-yard touchdown return of the second half kickoff; his second school-record return for a score in two weeks. Rupert Edwards rushed for 101 yards and a touchdown.

But none of that was enough. There were only 156 team rushing yards; as it would turn out, the lowest number of the year. The Rebels amassed twenty-five first downs, an all-time record for Cedar Park opponents. The T’wolves did come back from deficits twice during the game to take the lead, but neither time did that lead survive the next Rebel possession.

For the second game in a row, the Timberwolves scored in the fourth quarter to draw within 24-17. Also for the second consecutive game, they let that margin slip by displaying a vulnerability to long late touchdown plays.

Overall, offensive production slid by fifty yards from the opener, and although the lack of turnovers and penalties did allow for some optimism, neither the offense nor the defense were functioning anywhere near their calibrated design specs. Despite the welcome correction of the turnover problem, the offense had scored just ten points in both games.

The retooled defense wasn’t completely in synch yet with their new tactical approach, and at the moment it was looking like a potentially fatal liability, giving up large chunks of yardage on big-play touchdowns, having surrendered 69 points, 44 first downs, and five touchdowns of 57 yards or more in only two games.

And the team was 0-2, equaling the school’s worst start ever (2000). Cedar Park was now 6-17 since winning the 2001 district title; only six wins in twenty-three games beginning with those last 49 seconds at Waller.

No one had the slightest inkling that in the upcoming weeks, this Timberwolf football team would not only earn a chance to avenge this defeat with a second shot at Hays, but etch their names into Cedar Park history. This game would be their line drawn in the sand.

“We did some good things in both those losses,” Coach Weaver said of the opening games. “We knew it would take some time for the big defensive adjustments we made to really become effective. But the players and coaches had confidence that it would all come together. We could have played teams like Reagan and Johnston and LBJ in non-district, and yeah, we would have won, but we play tough teams to get tough. Beating LBJ and Reagan would have made us 2-0, but we wouldn’t have been nearly as good as we were even after starting 0-2 with the schedule we had.”

And indeed, the tide would begin to turn…

Game Stats | No Drive Chart Available

NEXT - Week Three: Killeen Ellison
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