Western Boone Jr. - Sr. High School

For the past couple of weeks, Western Boone head coach Justin Pelley has been stressing to his team that they have to clean up the self-inflicted problems. On Friday night, they saw what happened when they didn't. The Stars committed 13 penalties for 100 yards, several at inopportune times and North Montgomery topped the Stars 20-17. "They deserved to win and we didn't deserve to win," Western Boone head coach Justin Pelley said. "When you have that many penalties, and we aren't smart enough to not false start when they have been calling it all night - that's what happens. We should have lost to night and did." The problems started on the very first play of the game when Western Boone false started. The Stars did score on that drive to go up 7-0 after an 8-yard run by PhilipTalbott, and had a chance to go up more on its next drive before failing to convert on a fourth down from inside the North Montgomery 5. After a North Montgomery touchdown and two-point conversion to go up 8-7, WeBo drove the ball again deep into Charge territory, but had two touchdowns wiped out by penalty and had to settle for a 27-yard field goal from Talbott. Right before the half, the Chargers put together a drive, first getting a first down on second and 20 thanks to a WeBo pass interference, and then hitting a 38-yard pass on fourth and five to set up a touchdown in the final seconds of the half. But without the costly Stars miscues, they could have been up by a couple of scores instead of down four. "We have to watch the film and we are going to have to put some new guys in," Pelley said. "We're trying to play with seniors now and have a lot of sophomores playing, but it's all across the board, it's not just one person. We have guys playing both ways and tired, but they had guys going both ways too. They made plays tonight and we didn't." The Stars took the lead early in the fourth quarter on a 1-yard run by Cannon Brunes, but the Chargers came right back with a big drive, scoring on a 37-yard pass to take the lead 20-17. WeBo went three-and-out on its next possession, punting the ball away to the Chargers with 8:01 to go. North Montgomery was able to take 7 1/2 minutes off the clock, giving WeBo the ball back with little time to do anything. The Chargers offense provided some challenges to the Stars' defense, mainly the play of quarterback Ross Dyson. "Their quarterback is a good runner and can throw it a bit too," Pelley said. "We got exposed a little bit last week with Tri-West's quarterback running and that's what they did tonight too. They threw some balls up, No. 21 (Kelby Harwood) is a heck of a player. Those guys are pretty good and their quarterback keeps them in games because they can run the ball." Brunes had more than 150 yards rushing for the Stars in the game. The Stars will look to bounce back from back to back losses when they host Frankfort for Homecoming next week. "It's high school football, the sun's going to come up tomorrow and we are going to figure it out," Pelley said. "But we cannot overcome that many self-inflicted penalties like that. I'm anxious to see how we respond, but we are going to have to move some guys around as well." Will Willems is the Sports Editor of the Lebanon Reporter. Follow him on Twitter @Will_Willems.