By Mike Abler

After splitting their first two games, Meridian High School stampeded back over .500 with a 35-8 win on the road against Madison County High School last Friday.

The Mustangs didn’t waste any time putting points on the board. The scoring started with a seven-yard run from senior running back Griffin Harrison, then senior quarterback Evans Rice threw a 56-yard bomb to senior tailback Patrick Whitaker to build a 14-0 lead in the first quarter.

Another touchdown pass from Rice and a safety by the defense would have the Mustangs going into halftime with a 22-0 lead.

Head coach Adam Amerine said his team also employed a different style of play. While they’re usually a running team, they let the ball fly against Madison County.

“Traditionally, we like to run and run some more but Evans was throwing the ball well. So we rolled with that,” he explained.

It helped to provide impressive results on both sides of the ball. Rice was nearly unstoppable, completing 7 of 8 passes for 238 yards and three touchdown passes.

The only missteps by the offense was an incompletion by Rice and a missed extra point.

Another star of the game was Whitaker, who had three receptions for 107 yards and a touchdown. He accomplished all this on four targets.

The offense racked up 366 yards of total offense against Madison and will look to continue their dominance against Langley High School on the road. The following two games after that will be at home against Brentsville District High School and Skyline High School.

This game was a shot in the arm for the Mustangs who opened the season with a 37-7 win against Falls Church, until they suffered a 34-14 drubbing from Kettle Run High School. After failing to make the postseason during the spring Covid season due to total points scored, despite being co-district champions, Meridian is looking to turn things around this season.

“Our goal is to improve each week. While the win was nice, there are ways we can get better,” explained head coach Adam Amerine.

While there are seven games left this season, Amerine knows there are keys to continuing their success.

“We need to practice better and expand a few things,” he said. Amerine added that “We need to be ready for the tough opponents later in the year.

Langley is coming off an 0-3 start, but after that Meridian will face Brentsville which is 2-1, further cementing the fact that the games will get tougher as the season progresses.

Meridian is 1-1 on the road so far this year, if they can keep the hot streak going, they might be able to get themselves a winning streak.