Piedmont tops Leeds

Top-ranked Bulldogs win battle of reigning state champions behind Hayes, stout defense

By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today

PIEDMONT — It’s one thing to know what’s coming, it’s another to be able to do something about it.

Whenever top-ranked Piedmont needed a big play or a momentum mover Friday night, the ball went straight to Taylor Hayes and as usual he delivered.

The senior quarterback rushed for 149 yards, passed for 121 more and accounted for all four of his team’s touchdowns as the Bulldogs beat 4A Leeds 29-14 in a battle of reigning state champions.

In winning, 3A Piedmont beat the only team it lost to last year and extended the state’s longest winning streak to 16 games.

Hayes scored on runs of 1, 6 and 6 yards and threw a 24-yard TD pass to T.J. Fairs. His plays personally accounted for 13 first downs.

“Coach (Steve) Smith has a lot of confidence in me,” Hayes said. “I’ve been with that guy for six years, so I think I’ve built up the trust in him and I’m just honored to have him think of me like that.

“But no way in any fashion is it just me, because the guys in front of me are just great … This is probably one of the best (fronts) in the whole state, any classification. It’s easy to make first down when you’re not getting touched like four or five yards down the field. They might know that I’m getting the ball, but it’s another thing to get through the guys who are blocking for me.”

Hayes was particularly tough when the Bulldogs needed him most. He was 4-for-4 passing on the second-quarter scoring drive that gave his team a 22-7 halftime lead and he ran for 43 yards in a 58-yard fourth-quarter drive after Leeds (4-2) had closed to within 22-14 with more than seven minutes to play.

“When Taylor quit playing defense and became pretty much an offense-only type guy, you can’t take a kid with his mentality and say you’re going to run it five or six times a game,” Smith said. “He becomes our short-yardage back and a lot of times everybody knows he’s going to get it, but overlooked in all that is the play of our offensive line.

“We couldn’t run with Leeds as far as overall team speed, but we felt like our advantage was on the line of scrimmage on each side. They played five really good linemen, but they had to play both sides all the time and we played five offensive linemen and then four and five fresh defensive lineman and as you saw in the second half that took its toll on them.”

The Bulldogs made enough mistakes in the game to be worrisome. They lost two fumbles in the end zone and made three fourth-down letdowns in the drive that allowed the Green Wave to make it a one-score game in the fourth quarter, but their defense was always there to preserve the upper hand throughout.

The Bulldogs held Leeds to 151 yards of total offense — 65 in the second half.

“We knew their line was going to be very aggressive and tough, so we knew we had to come off strong,” junior defensive lineman Gavin Kircus said. “I knew with the line being so good and everyone talking the game up, I had to go out and do my part to help the defense. We had to do everything right to stop them.”

And they did, at virtually every turn.

Piedmont 29, Leeds 14

Leeds 7 0 0 7 — 14
Piedmont 6 16 0 7 — 29

P – Taylor Hayes 1 run (kick failed), 7:22 1Q
L – Gyderious Rogers 1 run (Gregory Dawkins kick), 5:41 1Q
P – Taylor Hayes 6 run (Tyler Bobbitt pass from Taylor Hayes), 7:10 2Q
P – T.J. Fairs 24 pass from Taylor Hayes (Taylor Hayes run), 0:31 2Q
L – Jakobi Hunter 16 pass from Jaylen Washington (Gregory Dawkins kick), 7:32 4Q
P – Taylor Hayes 6 run (Easton Kirk kick), 4:17 4Q

Team stats Lee Pied
First downs 5 20
Rushes-yds 32-129 48-237
Passing 2-5-0 6-9-1
Passing yds 22 121
Fumbles-lost 3-3 3-2
Punts-avg 4-26.3 1-27.0
Penalties-yds 3-15 3-35

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