Fort Worth Eastern Hills topples Western Hills in Battle of the Hills rivalry game

Friday night’s Battle of the Hills at Farrington Field was the first Texas high school football district game of the season for both Eastern Hills and Western Hills.

It was also the first time for the two teams to meet since a close match up last season to determine who would get the final playoff spot. Western Hills won 18-16 last season to make it to the playoffs.

“We talked about it this week,” Eastern Hills head coach Devvin Anderson said. “That was our main focus was to not give this one up and to get district started out with a win.”

And starting out district play with a win is exactly what the Highlanders did. They won the Battle of the Hills 32-22.

Eastern HIlls’ lead started early in the night when Tim Trahan took back the opening kick for a touchdown. With 11:42 left in the first quarter, the score was 8-0. They quickly scored another touchdown. This time it was quarterback Derek Harris who ran it into the endzone, the Highlanders were up 16-0 with 7:00 remaining in the first. Harris also scored the next touchdown of the night. HIs team was up 24-0 going into intermission.

“I just told them we have got to take it one point at a time, one score at a time,” Western Hills head coach Blake Moilan said. “Keep fighting through it. Obviously we can’t spot somebody 24 points and it’s tough to come back from that.”

Western Hills was determined to put points on the board in the third quarter. Even a big stop on third down by Eastern HIlls’ Marvy Miller didn’t prevent the Highlanders from scoring. Alex Richmond converted on fourth down.

This opened it up for quarterback Kyu Wilson to gain six yards on the first down and once again, Eastern Hills was able to covert on fourth down. Brendan Garner kept this play alive, then Alex Richmond scored the first touchdown of the night for the Cougars.

The second half saw three touchdowns for the Cougars. They tightened the gap to just 24-22 with less than five minutes left to play in the game.

“I am proud of the kids fight, I’m proud of the way we finished,” Moilan said. “But we have got to play four quarters.”

The Highlanders had one more touchdown in them. The final score of the night, was an interception by Eastern Hills’ Zach Bartley-Fox. He then took it back for a touchdown and the two point conversion was good. The Highlanders led 32-22 with1:56 left to play.

“We just wanted to use our athleticism and stay aggressive,” Anderson said. “That was pretty much all we did all night.”

One of the players that did that the best all night according to Anderson was wide receiver Draylon McGilvery, who has some of his own goals as the Highlanders continue district play.

“Locking in with my teammates, making sure everybody is straight keeping my players up and motivated and holding myself accountable,” McGilvery said.

Up next for the Cougars is a matchup against the Diamond HIll-Jarvis Eagles Thursday, October 3 at Scarborough-Handley Field.

“The second half we came out played well, we’ve got to play like that and lock in the whole game,” Western Hills wide receiver Brendan Garner said.

The Highlanders also hope to lock in when they face the Decatur Eagles Friday, October 4 at Decatur Eagle Stadium.