Hawks pick up their first loss in 17-0 rout by cane bay

Hanahan handled the first three opponents of the high school football season, outscoring the foes by a combined 124-53 margin. Now, coach Charlie Patterson will see how his team will handle adversity. The Hawks dropped their first game of the season last weekend when Cane Bay defeated the Hawks 17-0. Cane Bay held the Hawks to approximately 160 yards in total offense, which was well below the Hawks’ average in the three previous victories. Now, the Hawks must regroup when they battle another Class AAAA foe, the Stratford Knights on Friday. “We didn’t do things right,” Patterson said. “We might get away with making mistakes and not playing well against some teams. But we’re not going to get away with it when we play someone who has better athletes. This helped us realize we have to do things better. We did some things well, but there were other areas that weren’t good enough. We didn’t play well and lost Friday night. If we don’t get better, there will be other losses on Friday nights.” The Hawks never threatened to score against the Cobras, and the running game never got untracked. Quarterback Victor Colbert completed less than 50 percent of his passes for 120 yards while throwing two interceptions. “The defense played well,” Patterson said. “We essentially held them to 10 points. They got another (touchdown) near the end. Offensively, we couldn’t get it going. Kids are resilient and can bounce back. They probably handle adversity better than the coaches.” Turnovers, missed assignments and mental mistakes were magnified by the offense’s inability to move the ball. The team has been working in those areas since the first day of practice. They will still work on them this week, but will take a new approach in preparation for Stratford, which is 1-3 and is coming off a 24-10 loss against undefeated Ashley Ridge. “Sure, Stratford has a great tradition,” Patterson. “But I think we should focus on our team. One of the problems we had last week was that we worried too much about our opponent. We need to focus on ourselves. We need to focus on the basics, eliminating mistakes and trying to get better.” Friday’s game will be the last tune-up before Region 8-AAA play begins the first weekend in October. Berkeley is the defending league champion while the Hawks finished second. Hilton Head should contend for the title and has the best record among region teams with a 4-0 mark, outscoring foes 203-56. Hanahan is the only team above .500. Berkeley, the defending champ, opened the season with a victory, but has dropped three consecutive games. Patterson pointed out the Stags did manage to score 34 points in a lopsided loss to Cane Bay. However, the Stags surrendered 70 points in that loss. “Region games matter most,” Patterson said. “We want to win the region and get a good seed in the playoffs. I told the players that the good thing about football is that if you lose, you can turn things around seven days later. You get another chance to win.”