Timber Creek remains undefeated, soars past Keller Central with stellar second half

Keller Timber Creek’s Xavier Lee stole the show with four receiving touchdowns in the Falcons’ 37-14 win over Keller Central.

“I can’t say enough about him,” said Timber Creek head coach Austin Kaehn. “He’s an explosive threat, he works his tail off and it shows.”

Lee finished with 196 yards receiving and 51 yards rushing.

“It feels good,” said Lee. “It’s all glory to God. But we have a big game coming up next week against Southlake so we just got to stay focused.”

Even though he carried the bulk of the scoring, Lee gave credit to the rest of the Falcon receivers, as well.

“We have the best receiver room in the district,” he said. “We got Blaine [Everage], [Caleb] Mendji, Cameron Parnell, and Jackson Bass, and they’re all dogs.”

That receiver room took control of the game against the Chargers with all five touchdowns coming via passes from quarterback Carson Porter, who finished the night with 296 yards passing, five passing touchdowns, 48 yards rushing and a 2-point conversion reception.

Timber Creek started down at the beginning of the game after being forced to punt on its first possession. Central needed just three plays to get on the board, the scoring play being an 88-yard pass play from quarterback Landon Smith to running back Dylan McAfee.

The Falcons responded with Lee’s first touchdown of the night, a 23-yard reception with four minutes left in the first quarter.

Both teams scored again before the end of the first. Central’s running back Spencer Martin found the open field for a 49-yard rush. Timber Creek responded again with a pitch to Lee for 50 yards and, three plays later, a 24-yard pass to Lee for a game-tying touchdown.

Both teams failed to score before halftime, so the game was knotted up at 14 going into the second half.

“The football games we’ve played in so far—every one has been tough, so our kids knew how to respond and they weren’t phased at halftime and it showed in the second half.”

The Falcons were more than unphased, they were locked in. They didn’t allow Central to reach the end zone at all and only allowed them 47 yards of total offense.

Kaehn said he was extremely proud of the Timber Creek defense for bouncing back after its last game against L.D. Bell after nearly giving up a 31-point lead.

The offense also turned around its second-half performance from last week, scoring 23 points on three passing touchdowns from Porter and a 13-yard field goal from kicker Landyn Hicks.

Bass had one of those touchdowns on his only reception on the night, a 15-yarder that put the Falcons ahead 29-14.

Timber Creek converted on a 2-point attempt after that score when Mendji took the snap and found Porter wide open in the end zone.

The other two touchdowns, no surprise, fell into the hands of Lee, who had 102 yards receiving in the second half alone.

Running back Tony Hoagland led the Falcons in rushing yards with 81.

Central’s quarterback Smith finished the game with 153 yards receiving. 129 came in the first half. The Chargers run game was led by Martin, who finished with one touchdown and 88 yards rushing. McAfee led the team with 1 receiving touchdown, 88 yards receiving and 17 yards rushing.

Timber Creek, No. 6 in the Star-Telegram’s Class 6A rankings, improves to 4-0 on the season for the second time in school history with the first time being in 2017. Next week, the Falcons face powerhouse Southlake Carroll on the road in a face off between two undefeated teams.

The two schools are two of three schools in their district that are 4-0.