CHINA SPRING, Texas — The Franklin Lions defeated the China Spring Cougars 46-30 in 6 News' Game of the Week to kick off the Texas high school football season.
This premier matchup of two of the best Football programs in Central Texas was sure to impress. Franklin has been to four straight 3A state championships, winning two of them in 2021 and 2022. China Spring also won back-to-back state championships in 4A in the 2021 and 2022 seasons.
The heavyweight contest did not disappoint, and featured non-stop action from the very first snap.
China Spring fumbled on the first play from scrimmage, giving the Lions the football with a short field early.
Franklin took advantage of the Cougar turnover, running back Jayden Jackson ran it in for six to put the Lions up 7-0 early.
China Spring answered right back, the Cougars executed a quick 23-second drive that ended in RB Chrishon Gregory Jr. rushing in for the score to make it 7-7.
Turnovers were rampant early, China Spring recovered a fumble of their own and took a 10-7 lead after a Joseph Dickerson field goal.
Franklin continued to have good defense throughout the half, an end-zone interception by Wade Stallones brought the momentum back to the Lions.
After the interception, Franklin marched down the field all the way to a touchdown rush from Josh Lopez to increase the Lions' lead to 10.
China Spring came back with a touchdown themselves, but Franklin matched again going into the half with a 26-16 lead.
After striking first in the second half to bring the Lions' lead to 33-16, China Spring needed to answer quickly to stay in the game.
WR Christian Trevino came through for the Cougars with a deep-shot touchdown to cut the Franklin lead to 10. After a big stop on defense, China Spring was back in the game entering the fourth quarter after being down 17.
China spring looked to be on their way to another score after big completion to Trevino once again, but a fumbled snap stifled the Cougar momentum and gave Franklin the ball back with just over 10 minutes left to play in the game.
After the fumble, Franklin scored yet again, increasing their lead to 40-23
A late effort from China Spring proved unsuccessful as Franklin ended up closing out the victory 46-30.
Franklin leaves China Spring with a win and heads into a bye week 1-0. China Spring falls to 0-1 and heads to Bastrop next week and will look to get their first win.
Next week, 6 News will be heading to Ellison for the Game of the Week as they host Killeen. That game kicks off Friday, September 6 at 7 p.m. at Buckley Stadium.
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