Sandite All-Stars: Your leaders in offense

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By: Scott Emigh, Editor-in-Chief

It's been a tremendous season for the Sandites. While they're technically 5-4, on the field they're 7-2, not even including the Guthrie game that we were leading 18-7 when it was called off due to lightning. Two of our losses come from forfeitures (due to an ineligible player) that were actually wins of 61-8 and 33-7. So while the books say otherwise--we all know that realistically Sand Springs is 8-2, which (were it official) would make it our best record since 1997.

Not to mention we beat Booker T in total yardage of 232-217 and we're the only team to score first on them all season. We're also one of only two teams to lead them at any point all season. We also dealt Bixby their first shut out in seven years.

So who are the incredible players that have made all this impossible?

The following stats include both forfeitures and the Guthrie game. Whether officially recognized or not, they did happen.

Passing

The leader in passing is first-year starting junior quarterback Hunter Greathouse who has completed 71 of 140 for 1271 yards and 13 touchdowns, averaging 9 yards per pass attempt and 18 per completion. His season long is 70 yards against Guthrie, but has connected for huge throws in every game he's been in, including 63-yarders against Booker T and Bixby, and a 60 against Claremore. His best game this season was against Sapulpa when he threw 10-18-0-204 for 3 touchdowns. He is currently third in 6A-II.

  • Multi-purpose junior Kasey Bales also has a 37 yard pass against Enid and is 1 for 2 this season.
  • Freshman QB Caden Pennington connected on 1 of 2 passes at Hale for 8 yards. 
  • Senior holder Jacob Taber has had to throw a couple of passes this season due to bad snaps and is 1 of 2 for 5 yards.

Receiving

Senior Trace Fleischman is the go-to-guy on receptions with 26 catches for 593 yards and 4 touchdowns. His longest reception of the season was 70 yards against Guthrie. He is the #4 receiver in class 6A-II.

Kasey Bales is the only Sandite with both passing and receiving yards this season. He has 17 catches for 265 yards and 3 touchdowns. His longest reception of the season was 63 yards against Bixby.

Sand Springs has several other talented receivers.

  • Lane Lettich 10-165 and 2 touchdowns, long 44.
  • Ty Fain 7-107 and 1 touchdown, long 37.
  • Payton Scott 2-74 and 1 touchdown, long 59.
  • Josh Taber 4-50 and 1 touchdown (on his first play of the season), long 27.
  • Jake Ward 4-34, long 13.
  • Dalton Honneycut 2-26, long 13.

Rushing

Senior Lane Lettich is the clear leader on the ground for Sand Springs. He currently has 172 carries for 813 yards, averaging 4.73. He has 13 touchdowns and a long of 29 yards against Muskogee. His best game of the season was against Sapulpa where he carried 23 times for 133 yards and two touchdowns, though he had three touchdowns against Hale as well as Claremore. Lettich is #7 in 6A-II at rushing.

Trailing Lettich is sophomore Payton Scott who will likely be the starting tailback next season. He sits at 93 carries for 705 yards and 7 touchdowns with a long of 45 against Ponca City. He averages 7.58 yards-per-carry and his season-best was a breakthrough 17-200 and 2 touchdowns against Ponca. Scott is #9 in 6A-II at rushing. 

Lawton is the only other team with two players in the top-10 for rushing yards. 

Other Sandites with rushing yards are

  • Trace Fleischman 16-86, long 31.
  • Ben Norte 14-79, long 36.
  • Hunter Greathouse 50-25 and 2 touchdowns, long 23.
  • Tony Chinchilla 2-21 and 1 touchdown, long 11.
  • Kasey Bales 3-9, long 16.
  • Jaxon Starling 1-1.

#3 Sand Springs (5-4, 5-2) will enter the playoffs for the fourth-consecutive season tonight at #8 Stillwater (5-5, 3-3) and is the favorite to win. Sand Springs's offense averages 3.5 touchdowns per game.

#4 Sand Springs clobbers #9 Claremore 27-7 for Homecoming

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By: Scott Emigh, Editor-in-Chief

Click to Enlarge

It was a tough night for the Claremore Zebras at the Sand Springs Homecoming game as the Charles Page High School Sandites defeated them for the second year in a row, this time 27-7. The last time the two teams faced, Sand Springs sabotaged Claremore’s homecoming with a 17-0 shutout.

Sandite star running back Lane Lettich rushed for 64 yards and three touchdowns, meanwhile the Zebra’s star, Keegan Hisey was out due to an undisclosed injury. Hisey has 390 yards for the season while no other Claremore running back had more than 100 going into the game.

Several of Claremore’s starters were out after their 47-27 loss to Bixby last week, including their starting quarterback, Arron McCollough, defensive tackle Roger Starkey, and offensive lineman Hunter Nixon. Though most are expected to return next week, they were certainly missed Friday night at Memorial Stadium.

The Sand Springs defense was as spectacular as usual, holding the Zebras to only two red-zone penetrations and barely 200 yards of total offense.

Senior Jacob Fortune got his second start and first full game at kicker and averaged just shy of 54 yards per kickoff with one touchback. After a dropped kick attempt in a week one game against Tulsa Hale, Fortune was eager to prove himself. “I finally got my chance,” he said after the game, “and I nailed it.”

It took a little time for the home team to find their rhythm, needing ten plays to find the endzone, but they finally got on the board midway through the first quarter on a 1 yard carry by Lettich. 

Claremore returned the favor on their first possession of the second quarter. Alex Moore intercepted a pass from Sandite quarterback Hunter Greathouse and five plays later the Zebras capitalized on it with a 28 yard pass from Noah Grimett to Paul Hoke. This was Grimett’s first varsity start at quarterback and third career touchdown. He ended the game just shy of 180 yards of total offense and completed more than half of his 11 passes.

It would also be the only Zebra touchdown, and Sand Springs scored on their next possession on a 3 yard carry by Lettich.

It took only three plays for the Sandites to travel 76 yards and score on a 60 yard pass from Greathouse to Trace Fleischman barely a minute into the half. A two point conversion attempt failed, but the Sandites drew blood again on a 5 yard carry by Lettich in the fourth quarter.

Kasey Bales was three-for-three on extra point attempts for Sand Springs and Payton Scott and Brett Freeman both grabbed key fumbles.

Homecoming Kissing Captain Jacob Taber had seven tackles for the Sandites, surpassed only by Junior Delvin Jordan, though he was probably more excited about his 1-for-1 record on kissing dancers.

Varsity Dance team-member Addy Lee was named Homecoming Queen and was stunning in a beautiful red dress.

Claremore (2-3, 0-2) will next take on Booker T Washington (4-0, 2-0) in week three of district play and will need to pull off a big upset to have a shot at the playoffs. The Sandites (1-3, 1-1) found their first technical win after having to forfeit their first two victories earlier this week due to an ineligible player.

With Bixby, Booker T Washington, and Bartlesville expected to win playoff spots from district 1, the rest of the district is vying for that fourth position.

Next week Sand Springs hopes to move a bit closer to that goal as they travel to Sapulpa (1-3, 0-2) to take on their long-time Highway 97 rivals. 

*This article has been corrected to reflect that Grimett's touchdown against CPHS was his third career TD, not his 1st, as he scored two against Bixby as a mid-game replacement.

**The graphic at the beginning of this article has been corrected to attribute 3 fumbles to Claremore instead of Sand Springs.