Sealy junior quarterback D’vonne Hmielewski was intercepted four times and visiting Stafford turned two of them directly into touchdowns to help earn a 28-14 win Friday night, spoiling the Tigers’ homecoming contest at T.J. Mills Stadium.

After Spartan junior quarterback Brayden Batiste opened the scoring 8:33 before halftime, the visitors recovered the ensuing kickoff on Sealy’s 17-yard line and scored four plays later. On the Tigers’ first play from scrimmage trailing by two touchdowns, Isaiah Bogerty recorded an interception at Sealy’s 14-yard line. Stafford scored on its first play from scrimmage to extend a 21-0 lead with 6:14 left before halftime.

Head Football Coach Shane Mobley said there were plenty of emotions being felt on the Tiger sideline but there was a fine line to navigate.

“Some of the kids were getting fired up and that’s really good but you don’t want to get to a temperamental emotional state because then it takes you out of the game or you start turning on someone and start pointing fingers,” Mobley said. “You want to use it as a momentum to try to fire some people up and then you want something good to happen.”

Once the team got into the locker room for the halftime intermission, Mobley said the staff extended a challenge to the team.

“That we weren’t broken,” he said of the halftime message. “That’s the first time we’ve gone in down at the half and being down by three touchdowns, so all we did was challenge them, ‘Let’s get one score at a time.’”

Sealy senior Connor Krenek took that to heart and returned the second-half kickoff 82 yards for the Tigers’ first touchdown of the game. The hosts followed that up with an onside kick and recovered it at the Spartans’ 49-yard line.

Sealy was unable to fully capitalize on the momentum out of the intermission and eventually, Hmielewski’s third interception was turned into points eight plays later to help the Spartans build to a 28-7 lead. The junior signal-caller formulated a response and crossed the goal line on a nine-yard rumbling run to cut into the deficit in the fourth quarter but the fourth and final giveaway sealed the deal.

“Offensively we moved the ball, we just couldn’t get into the end zone and I know that’s frustrating but that’s what happens against good defenses,” Mobley said.

The Tigers’ defense played the role of a solid unit too as it held an explosive offense to 28 points and forced six punts, one of which was blocked by Krenek.

“This has probably been our best game stopping the run right at us. Navasota ran it right down our throats, so did Lake Creek on its opening drive,” Mobley said. “(Stafford) kind of had to throw the ball and I think they wanted to run it more. I thought up front and our linebackers did a really good job and we were trying to keep them from isolating us one on one, but there were sometimes where we had to go one on one and they had a couple good throws and catches.”

Both offenses registered similar numbers according to stats provided by the Sealy Tiger Sports Network. Sealy finished with 220 yards – 143 through the air and 77 on the ground – on 54 plays with a time of possession at 20:56. Stafford recorded 222 yards – 148 passing and 74 rushing – on 49 plays with a time of possession at 27:04.

Sealy’s overall record fell to 2-2 with one non-district game remaining in Bay City next week. The Blackcats were forced to cancel this week’s game with Vidor following damage from Tropical Storm Nicholas but will enter 2-1 overall with wins over two of the Tigers’ district foes in Sweeny (19-9) and Wharton (21-9) and a loss to Edna (31-13).

Sealy fared better against the injury bug tonight compared to the previous two weeks and Mobley hoped to see more names being removed from the injury report heading into the final non-district game of the season.

“It’s kind of like going into this week, we knew we had some injuries coming off last week then all of sudden we had some other phone calls saying, ‘Coach I won’t be there,’” Mobley said. “We will have some kids back next week and I think that will help us quite a bit, defensively for sure.”

Scoring Summary

Stafford 0-21-7-0

Sealy 0-0-7-7

Q1

No scoring

Q2

8:33: Stafford Brayden Batiste 21 rush, Ivan Maldonado kick, 7-0

6:32: St Jamaal Wiley 3 rush, Maldonado kick, 14-0

6:14: St Batiste to Tyler Miller 6 pass, Maldonado kick, 21-0

Q3

11:44: Sealy Connor Krenek 82 kickoff return, Amador Lopez kick, 21-7

1:22: St Wiley 4 rush, Maldonado kick, 28-7

Q4

10:59: Se D’vonne Hmielewski 9 rush, Lopez kick, 28-14