Monroe County’s defense dominated Barren County on Friday night.

The No. 9 Falcons (4-0) limited the Trojans to 63 yards on 51 plays and got three touchdown passes from Justin Harlan to pick up a 21-0 win and spoil the Trojans’ homecoming.

Falcons coach John Petett called his called his team’s defensive play “exceptional”.

“We knew that we were very good defensively, but we hadn’t faced a team that would spread us out like this team and had good quarterbacks, just hard-nosed,” Petett said. “And I tell you what, they stepped up to the occasion tonight and they rose up and had a shutout. I’m tickled to death.”

And the stats more than back up Petett's assessment. Monroe held Barren to 30 rushing yards on 35 plays, which included a 35-yard loss on bad snap on a third quarter punt. The Trojans had only 33 passing yards. They also threw two interceptions and lost one fumble.

All in all, it was one tough night for Jeff Richey’s team.

“We played horrible and I’m going to capitalize the word horrible,” the Trojan coach said. “I did a horrible job coaching, my game plan must have been 10 miles off, because obviously nothing was working. We tried midline, we tried veer, we tried power, we tried counter, we tried screen, we tried vertical, we tried shallow, we tried anything that we could think of, and we had 69 (63) yards of offense. So the other side of that is Monroe County is dang good.”

Barren (1-3) had 11 possessions in the game. Five drives ended in punts, three in turnovers and three also came to a halt on downs. The Trojans had the ball in Falcon territory five times, but only once drove the ball inside the 20.

“All the talk about, well they were 2-9 last year and they haven’t beaten anybody, well I’m going to tell you what - they’ve got a very good ball club and everybody that is ready to crown Green County (district) champions better wait until this team plays, because they’re pretty dang good,” Richey said.

The Falcons used the big play to set up their first score. Tanner Kendall ripped a 37-yard run on his team’s second drive. Harlan rushed for 17 yards and Sheldon Hamilton kept it on the ground for seven more. That set up a 4-yard touchdown pass from Harlan to Caleb Maxey. Justin Carter’s extra point was good to give Monroe a 7-0 lead with 4:41 left in the first quarter.

Monroe used a little trickery to add to its lead. The Falcons started at their own 20-yard line with 3:02 left in the first have and moved just into Trojan territory on six plays. Hamilton threw a 38-yard halfback pass to Neil Wilson to set up first and goal.

Harlan found Wilson free for a 9-yard touchdown pass on the very next play and the Falcons led 14-0 with 2:03 left to go in the half.

“It was huge,” Petett said of his team’s trick play. “We were having trouble. Barren has great defensive ends and just a great defense and we had trouble all night with it. We made a big play there and it was a great catch from Sheldon Hamilton to Wilson.

“The thing about it is last week we had trouble scoring in the red zone and tonight we scored in one or two plays. So that was big for us.”

The Falcons added their final score after taking advantage of a Trojan miscue. Barren got the ball to begin the second half and moved just into Monroe territory. The Falcons forced the Trojans to punt, but the snap was high and rolled back to the 14-yard line.

Harlan hit Hamilton for a 14-yard scoring pass on the first play of the drive. Carter’s extra point gave the Falcons a 21-0 lead at the 9:20 mark of the third quarter.

Monroe rolled up 342 yards of offense on the night. The Falcons rushed for 246 yards and passed for 96.

Despite giving up nearly 350 yards to the Falcons, the Trojans did have some success on defense. Barren stopped Monroe twice on downs in the first half and forced a pair of turnovers in the second half.

“Right now the only thing we can do is look forward,” Richey said. “Monday can not get here fast enough. There’s no way I want to dwell on this, because if you dwell on this it’s going to be a horrible, horrible weekend.”

Both teams open district play next week. The Trojans host Grayson County at Trojan Field. The Falcons host Metcalfe County. Both games kick off at 7 p.m.



Score by quarter

Monroe 7 7 7 0 - 21

Barren 0 0 0 0 - 0

Monroe rushing

Sheldon Hamilton 16-77, Tanner Kendall 5-74, Caleb Maxey 12-63, Justin Harlan 9-25, Neil Wilson 1-5, Nathan Davis 1-2.



Barren rushing

Tim Sneed 7-38, Gill Thomas 12-11, Kris Aquino 4-9, Colton Phelps 7-9, Tyler Wilson 2-5, Tyler Hughes 1-1, Austin Birge 1-(-8), Caleb Bogard 1-(-35).



Monroe passing

Justin Harlan 7/18, 58 yds., 3 TD, INT

Sheldon Hamilton 1/1, 38 yds.



Barren passing

Colton Phelps 6/13, 29 yds., INT

Gill Thomas 2/3, 4 yds., INT

Monroe receiving

Neil Wilson 4-63 (TD), Caleb Maxey 2-3 (TD), Garrett Lyon 1-15, Sheldon Hamilton 1-15 (TD).



Barren receiving

Tim Sneed 2-28, Tyler Hughes 2-16, Kris Aquino 2-(-2), Matt Bell 1-(-1), Austin Birge 1-(-8).