For all the balance between the two schools on paper, there was one striking difference between the Carson and Douglas football teams on the field Thursday night.
Carson was mostly speed and finesse and Douglas was mostly grit and grind.
In the end, speed won out.
"Team speed worried me and it just ate us alive," Douglas coach Mike Rippee said after the 34-6 loss in Carson City. "They had great team speed. It was a big concern for us and it was a key factor tonight."
Nowhere on the field was it more apparent than wherever Carson standout sophomore Dylan Sawyers happened to be at any given moment. Sawyers, who finished with 14 carries for 117 yards and two touchdowns on the ground, was most effective when he was working on sweeps to the outside.
"We were concerned about their perimeter game because that's an area where we are weak," Rippee said. "We just lack that team speed to a certain extent. We have tough kids, but the speed isn't there.
"You look at that screen pass (which Sawyers took 48 yards for a touchdown in the third quarter) and we had three people in position to make the play and he outran all three of them. At times, we'd get wide and he'd find a seam and cut back inside. We just couldn't make the play on him."
In total, the Senators rolled to 316 rushing yards to go with 126 passing yards.
Now Douglas faces the unenviable task of trying to put its worst loss since October of last year in the past and getting ready for the first round of the playoffs.
"We just have to be men about it," Rippee said. "If this is the worst thing that happens in your life, then you are going to have a wonderful life. (Losing like this) is a disappointment, no doubt.
"It's a team loss, from the head coach on down. We're not going to go home and sulk. We're not going to point fingers and say if we just would've done this or that. We're going to regroup and watch film, get better and get something done in the playoffs.
"We got outplayed in every aspect of the game tonight. That happens. So what do you do? You can't accept it. If it doesn't leave a bad taste in your mouth, then something is wrong. We just have to move forward, get ready for next week and put this whole thing in the past."
The good news for the Tigers is that the three-way tiebreaker thought to determine seeding for the playoffs was in reality only to determine first place. According to the NIAA, the tiebreaker reverts back to the head-to-head competition after first-place is determined, so Douglas will be hosting its first-round playoff game for the third-consecutive season.
