Defense proves key as North Myrtle Beach wins in Reel’s head coaching debut | Myrtle Beach Sun News

The North Myrtle Beach football team relied on a solid defensive effort en route to a 14-6 victory over Timberland in its season opener that included the debut of first-year head coach Matt Reel.

Key performers

A short list of players who had big games, formatted as follows:

Tyler Gore, North Myrtle Beach: Had two touchdown receptions.

Cason McClendon, North Myrtle Beach: Chiefs quarterback threw for two TDs.

By the numbers

1

Reel’s win total as Chiefs head coach.

20

Total points scored in a defensive battle.

They said it

“A lot of mistakes tonight, man, a lot of turnovers. [It was] not very typical of the preseason we’ve had so far.” – NMB coach Matt Reel

“The defense played lights out all night. They gave up a touchdown I think late in the third quarter, early in the fourth quarter – and it just from us giving away a bad turnover and gave our defense real bad field position. They were lights out all night, man. They played great, played hard. Offensively, we just didn’t play a very good football game tonight. So we’ve got to do better in that area next week obviously. But our kids competed super hard, played hard. The effort was really good for our guys; we’ve just got to execute a little better.” – Reel

“Excited for the guys – not necessarily for me – but for the kids. The kids have worked hard since – you know, we lost that third-round [playoff] game last year – we’ve really been in the weight room and just trying to make ourselves a better football team. I’m just happy for them. With this being my first game as a head coach, I thought there may have been a little bit more nerves, but just knowing the kids and knowing our coaches it was really easy getting into it and nothing really changed, man. [We’re] just trying to make the best play calls we can and coach our kids as hard as we can.” – Reel

Up next

North Myrtle Beach: at Loris