Henry runs wild in 34-10 Sumter victory over Conway
CONWAY - Jonathan Henry's third carry of the night was disastrous.
The Sumter High School tailback had the ball punched out of his arms -- inside the red zone, no less -- and blew a golden scoring opportunity for he and his Gamecock teammates.
Consider the misdeed forgiven.
Henry finished with 212 rushing yards and four total touchdowns in leading No 9 Sumter to a 34-10 win over Conway on Friday.
"When you have turnovers, you always want to make up for it," the senior said. "You always want to do better. If you have turnovers, you want to play better."
The 5-foot-11-inch, 190-pounder had touchdown runs of 3, 37 and 22 yards. He also ran a perfect wheel route out of the backfield for a 20-yard receiving touchdown just prior to halftime that gave the Gamecocks their first lead.
Prior to that, it had been a bumpy first 22 minutes.
After Henry's fumble, which came with 7:12 to go in the opening quarter, Conway ground out the clock went ahead 7-0. Henry's first score came midway through the second quarter, and moments later is where the game really turned.
On the next play from scrimmage, Conway quarterback Dequinton Grady was sacked and injured. At least partially as a result, the Tigers went from the 2:34 mark of the first quarter to the 2:19 of the third without a first down.
"Obviously we caught a break tonight - I hope their quarterback is OK. But when he went down, their offense changed a bunch," Sumter head coach Mark Barnes said. "We ought to be a good offensive football team. We just didn't look like we were in sync until the second half. Then we started playing a lot better."
Of course, a lot of that had to do with Henry's burst.
After a relatively light 38 yards rushing in the first half, he exploded for 174 in the second. And although he did put the ball on the ground once more in the third quarter (it was recovered by a teammate), Barnes said it wasn't enough to make him change course.
"There's two ways. If you're a compulsive fumbler, yeah, I'm going to bench you," Barnes said. "[Henry] is not that kind of guy. Normally he takes care of the football. That was very uncharacteristic of him."
Henry wasn't the only player who had turnover issues. Gamecock quarterbacks Ontra' Harvin and Hayden Vasquez each threw an interception. However, none of that did anything but slightly delay Sumter taking control of this rivalry again.
Conway won the game last season to claim the Region VI-5A crown. However, in the past 11 years total, the Gamecocks are now 8-3 against the Tigers.
In the immediate, people are starting to wonder just how good this 3-0 Sumter team could be. It has opened the season with three double-digit victories and is now considered by most to be the favorite in Region IV-5A. Barnes' team will have a couple more non-region games before starting to figure that out, but Henry and Co. proved what they can accomplish when they take care of business.
"First half, we weren't focused," Henry said. "We made too many mistakes. We have to do better. We came out the second half and played a lot better."