The Russellville varsity football team went on the road to face the Class 3A No. 4 ranked Mars Hill Bible School Panthers in front of a packed stadium August 30, and the Golden Tigers fell to 1-1 on the season after a 28-14 loss. 

Mars Hill (2-0) took the opening kickoff of the contest and needed five rushing attempts to find the end zone as Caden Chandler put the Panthers ahead with a three-yard touchdown carry. The first Russellville offensive possession was short-lived because of an interception on the third play of the drive by Jaxon Penn of Mars Hill. 

The Golden Tigers were able to tie the score when Cam Phinizee crossed the goal line for a two-yard touchdown run on fourth down that was followed by a successful Manny Martinez extra-point kick with 7:28 remaining in the second quarter. 

Mars Hill took the lead again on the following drive that lasted nine plays. A 35-yard touchdown pass from William Mann to Hudson Higgins was the scoring play that helped put the Panthers up 14-7 with 2:51 left until halftime. 

RHS had the ball to start the second half, and the Golden Tigers needed six plays to tie the score as Whit Goodwin connected with Gunner Sappington for a touchdown on an 11-yard scoring pass. Five of the six plays on the drive were passes with additional completions coming from Goodwin to Sappington, Cade Parker and Jah Williams. 

The Panthers went back ahead on the following possession by using seven-straight running plays. A fumble by Mars Hill on the last play of the drive was recovered in the end zone by Chandler and the extra-point kick by the Panthers made the score 21-14 with 5:40 to go in the third period. 

The next three possessions of the game ended with two fumbles by Russellville and one by Mars Hill sandwiched in between with Sappington recovering the turnover by the Panthers. Mars Hill was able to convert the last RHS fumble into points with a drive that finished with a 16-yard touchdown run by Penn with 5:30 left in the fourth quarter. 

“I definitely thought we did some things better than we did last week, but overall we had too many turnovers,” explained Russellville head coach Dustin Goodwin. “We didn’t win the turnover battle tonight, and I’m really disappointed in myself. I felt like I put our guys in some situations that I probably shouldn’t, but I’m proud of the way they fought. I hate that we came up short, but we’ll get better from it, and we’ll get better going forward.” 

Next for the Golden Tigers will be a trip to Lawrence County Sept. 6 to take on the Red Devils in a Class 5A Region 8 battle. LCHS is 2-0 on the season with wins over East Lawrence and Rogers.