Amarillo High rolls Lubbock Coronado inching closing into playoff position

Nothing’s quite official yet, but the Amarillo Sandies are closing in on continuing after the regular season ends.

In a game which featured a lot of offense, the Sandies hosted Lubbock Coronado in a crucial District 2-5A Division I game Thursday night at Dick Bivins Stadium.

Amarillo High made a statement by dominating in the second half to roll to a 54-14 victory which placed the Sandies in a tie for second in the district with two games remaining in the regular season.

That means the magic number for Amarillo High (4-3, 3-1 in district) is now down to one, as the Sandies only need to win one of their final two games to clinch a playoff berth.

In a lot of ways, the win over Coronado (2-7, 1-4) was fairly typical of how the Sandies have operated this year. They had a typically big game on offense and had a bend but not break defensive performance which was enough to get them through.

The offense though was the star as it has been all season. Amarillo High closed out the game with 27 unanswered points to cruise to victory and didn’t punt until the final minutes.

While Coronado controlled the ball most of the first half, it didn’t translate into points. Amarillo High, on the other hand, got big plays from the arms and legs of quarterback Jett Lopez, a consistent theme throughout the night, to take a 21-7 halftime lead.

Coronado got the opening kickoff and was stopped on downs at the Amarillo High 33-yard line. Three plays later the Sandies scored when Lopez hit Jude Dunavin on a perfectly executed screen pass for a 49-yard touchdown and a 7-0 lead.

On Amarillo High’s next possession, Lopez was flushed out of the pocket and took advantage of an open field ahead of him, running 35 yards for a touchdown and a 14-0 lead.

Despite moving the ball well, Coronado only scored once in the first half. That came on an 18-yard run by Demarion Finch midway through the second quarter to cut it to 14-7.

The Sandies answered in their next possession when Lopez took a basic quarterback draw and squirted up the middle for a 27-yard run to make it 21-7. It was just one highlight of a night in which Lopez completed 14-of-25 passes for 272 yards and four touchdowns and ran for 91 yards on only five carries.

Coronado then drove deep into Sandie territory and faced a fourth-and-goal at the AHS 1. The Mustangs opted to go for it, but the Sandies stonewalled Finch less than a foot from the goal line to hold.

That sort of summed up the offensive frustration of Coronado’s offense in the first half. The Mustangs moved the ball great between the 20-yard lines and piled up 278 yards, but had only seven points to show for it.

Amarillo High got the ball in great field position to start the second half when Jaylend Brashears returned the kickoff to the Coronado 26, setting up the first of two touchdown runs by Dunavin from 16 yards to make it 27-7.

The Mustangs answered back two minutes later on a 1-yard run by Finch to make it 27-14 and it still looked like a ball game.

However, the Sandies were unstoppable on the night.

Lopez threw scoring passes of 41 yards to Trey Warnsley and 16 yards to Cooper Manning before the end of the quarter to make it 40-14 and pretty much end the competitive phase of the game.

The Sandies were balanced offensively with 253 yards rushing to give them 525 yards offense for the game. Dunavin ran for 96 yards on only 11 carries.

Coronado racked up 429 yards of offense and quarterback Isaiah Vazquez threw for 344, but it wasn’t nearly enough.