It was a full stadium on hand for Homecoming and Alumni Night and the Golden Eagles didn’t disappoint as Shelbyville Central rolled to a 30-3 victory over Region 5-5A foe Lincoln County at the Eagles Nest on Friday night.

After a sluggish first half, the Eagles outscored the Falcons 24-0 in the second half to claim the win.

“We just played terrible on offense in the first half and I just don’t understand it. I really don’t. You can understand why I don’t understand it because we didn’t change anything at the half. We ran the exact same plays in the second half and it looked a lot different,” Shelbyville Central coach Justin Palmer said. “I know it was homecoming week and there were a lot of other things going on but we didn’t do a good job of balancing the other activities and playing football.”

The Eagles got on the board early when defensive lineman Austin McBee recovered a fumble and ran 19 yards for a touchdown. The two point conversion attempt failed leaving the score 6-0.

Lincoln County connected on a Reid Hardin 22 yard field goal with 0:11 in the half to cut the lead to 6-3 at the intermission.

“Give credit to our defense for allowing only three points in the first half, even though we gave up too many yards on a few plays that we could have stopped for a short gain or maybe even had a loss,” Palmer said.

The second half was a different story as the Eagles totally dominated the game is all phases.

Shelbyville Central took the opening possession of the second half and march down the field but had to settle for a Harrison Canter 20 yard field goal to make the score 9-3.

Elijah Malone intercepted Falcon quarterback Jake Sorrells at the Eagle 19 and returned it to the Shelbyville 33 with 4:28 left in the third quarter, setting the stage for the first Marsh touchdown just seven plays later. Canter connected on the point after to increase the lad to 16-3.

Malone then recovered a Lincoln County fumble to set up the Eagles' next touchdown, a Slayde Simmons 33 yard pass from sophomore quarterback Kade Cunningham to make the score 23-3 going into the fourth quarter.

Shelbyville Central added a score late in the fourth quarter off a 10 yard run up the middle by Caleb Marsh with Canter good on the point after.

“I need to see our offense play the entire game like we did in the second half,” Palmer said. “We will continue to work and get better because we still have a number of challenging games ahead of us on the schedule.”

Cunningham connected on 12-of-21 passes for 146 yards with a touchdown and an interception.

Simmons had seven catches for 100 yards while Marsh rushed for 154 yards on 18 carries.

Malone had an interception, fumble recovery and six tackles for the Eagles. McBee recovered a pair of fumbles and six tackles, Gary Smith III had 12 tackled while Jordan Henderson collected 11 tackles.

The Eagles host Cleveland in a non-region game on Friday night at 7.

Lincoln County 0 3 0 0 - 3

Shelbyville Central 6 0 17 7 - 30

First Quarter

SC – Austin McBee 19 fumble return (pass failed) 10:58.

Second Quarter

LC – Reid Hardin 22 field goal 0:11.

Third Quarter

SC – Harrison Canter 20 field goal 7:56.

SC – Caleb Marsh 1 run (Canter kick) 2:05.

SC – Slayde Simmons 33 pass from Kade Cunningham (Canter kick) 0:54.

Fourth Quarter

SC – Marsh 10 run (Canter kick) 0:02.

THE YARD STICK

LC SC

Rushing Yards 119 293

Passing Yards 113 146

Total Yards 232 439

First Downs 9 24

Penalties-Yards 1-10 5-50

Turnovers 4 3

Returns-Yards 5-89 5-59

3rd Down Conversions 4-of-8 4-of-9

4th Down Conversions 0-of-1 0-of-2

Time of Possession 23:43 24:18