3A Playoffs: Flyers jet past North Sanpete

The Dixie Flyers used a steady dose of the passing game mixed with a solid rushing attack to cruise past North Sanpete and into the next round of the state tournament.

The Flyers took their aerial attack on the road and blasted the Hawks 35-6 on their home turf. Blake Barney was spot on for the Flyers, completing 15 of 22 passes for 218 yards and two touchdowns.

“He was just solid for us tonight,” Dixie coach Blaine Monkres said. “He executed the offense really well. He completed a lot of balls when he had to and we were able to keep drives going on third down when he had to make big plays for us.”

Not be outdone by the offense, the Flyers defense stymied North Sanpete. The Hawks managed to score a touchdown with 18 seconds remaining in the game, but true to its effort all night, the Dixie defense blocked the extra point. Tyson Graff led the Dixie defense with 17 tackles, while Jesse Lambert added another 10.

Blake Barney (5), shown in this file photo from earlier this season, had a great game against North Sanpete. Photo taken in Hurricane, Utah, Sept. 14, 2012 | Photo by Chris Edwards

“The defense stepped up tonight and made a couple of stops on fourth down when they went for it,” Monkres said. “It gave us good field position and we were able to stick it in the end zone.”

The Hawks had just 216 yards against Dixie on 59 plays, an average of just 3.7 yards per play. In contrast, the Flyers had 381 yards on 54 plays, averaging 7.1 yards a play.

The game was scoreless in the first quarter, but Barney rushed in a 5-yarder on the first play of the second to make it 7-0. The rest of the second quarter was a defensive struggle. Dixie finally broke through when Barney found Mitch Wilkinson from 10-yards out with 1:53 to go until halftime. Moments later, after a North Sanpete turnover, Joseph Takau plunged in from a yard out to make it 21-0.

Dixie put the game on ice in the second half with a TD pass from Barney to Lukas Hildebrandt from 38 yards out and another Takau TD, this time from 2-yards out.

The Flyers (8-2) will now travel to take on the undefeated Stansbury Stallions next week in the 3A Quarterfinals. Stansbury beat Union 60-26.

Boxscore: dixns12

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Twitter: @k_seeg

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2012, all rights reserved.

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