Spartans advance by blanking Western

Steve Cunningham

Monday, Nov. 17, 1997 | 12:47 p.m.

It was, as they say, a prime-time effort.

Cimarron-Memorial's football team has been impressive just about all season long, but Friday's 33-0 whitewashing of Western in the 4A Southern Conference championship contest was truly a thing of beauty.

The Spartans moved the ball effectively against the defending state champs, led by Arnold Parker's 196 yards on 21 carries. And the defense, although giving up chunks of yardage here and there, kept the Warriors out of the end zone.

Cimarron coach Greg Spencer thought it was one of his team's best performances of the campaign.

"Offensively, we changed a couple of schemes up front blocking-wise," he said. "Coach (Rod) Smeltzer came up to me last week and said we were not going to be as conservative as we were the first time we played Western. That made a big difference.

"With the exception of the specialty teams, it was as good of a performance as we've turned in."

One of the keys for Cimarron in the game was to put points on the board first, making the Warriors, who keep the ball predominantly on the ground, play catch-up. Parker busted off a 55-yard run late in the first quarter, setting up quarterback Toby Smeltzer's one-yard jaunt to make it 7-0.

The Spartans forced Western to punt on their next possession, but Tom Bryan's kick was fumbled by Charles Sanford and the Warriors apparently had the ball at midfield. But the play was called back because Sanford was bumped by a Western player while attempting to field the boot.

Again Bryan punted and again, Cimarron fumbled the kick. Detrick Brown let the ball squirt from his arms but the Spartans received another huge break by recovering. After getting two reprieves, Cimarron drove 50 yards in six plays, with Parker scoring from six yards out to make it 14-0.

Western took the ensuing kickoff and drove 85 yards to the Cimarron one, looking to get back in the game by halftime. The Warriors, however, were hit with one of their bugaboos from the season.

An illegal motion penalty on first down pushed the ball back to the six. Rosco Denson gained the yardage back on the first play but Cimarron stopped De'Angelo Floyd for no gain on successive plays and threw Marcus Lewis for a two-yard loss on fourth down.

Instead of a 14-7 game at the half, Cimarron maintained the two-touchdown margin.

"When we stopped them down at the goal line, I think it popped Western's bubble a little bit," Spencer said. "If they score there, they would have gone in (to the intermission) with a little momentum."

Western controlled the ball for most of the third quarter but saw two long drives end deep in Cimarron territory. Cimarron then put the game away with 19 fourth-quarter points. Darian Hall scored on a three-yard run and Parker added scores of 25 and two yards.

Next up for the Spartans is McQueen, the state runner-up from a year ago, in the title game Friday at Sam Boyd Stadium. Spencer will only concede he thought his squad had playoff potential before the season began. The success that has followed, well ...

"To be honest with you, I thought we had good enough talent, and that we do a good enough job coaching here at Cimarron, to get into the playoffs," Spencer said. "I'm a firm believer that the playoffs are the third part of the season and that anything can happen there.

"With a break here or there, any one of the eight teams from down here (who qualified for the postseason) could be doing what we're doing."

But it'll be the Spartans playing for the state championship.

* Cimarron (11-1) will take on McQueen (11-0) in the final title game of the day Friday at 7 p.m. Indian Springs (9-0) takes on Eureka (9-1) in the 1A tilt at 10 a.m.; The Meadows (8-1) faces Carlin (10-0) at 1 p.m. for the 2A championship; Virgin Valley (10-1) meets Spring Creek (8-3) for the 3A title at 4 p.m.

* TIDBITS: The Southern Nevada 4A Football Coaches Association has three new inductees for its Hall of Fame. Rich Whitehead, Dave Gerber and Joe Blockovich were honored in ceremonies at the Cimarron-Western game Friday night. Whitehead compiled over 100 wins at Clark and his 1971 and 1972 teams won state titles. Gerber racked up 109 wins in his career. He took Valley to the state championship game in 1984 and 1987 and won state titles at Bishop Gorman in 1974 and 1979. Blockovich guided Western to the state championship in 1992 and was a head coach for 18 years. In addition, the SNFCA awarded Ron Futrell, the sports director at KTNV Channel 13 with the news media award ... Former Valley basketball standout Jevon Banks signed with Texas Tech this past week. Banks, who currently is at Midland (Tex.) College, will have three years of eligibility with the Red Raiders. Banks averaged 17.5 points, six rebounds, five steals and five assists at Valley last year. The Vikings advanced to the 4A state semifinals.