CCHS begins season with shutout of St. John (Updated)

Central Catholic may have totaled 30 points with two different Eagles scoring touchdowns and another topping 100 yards rushing, but it was the defense that stole the show in the squad’s season-opening 30-0 victory against St. John of Plaquemine Thursday in Morgan City.
The Eagles (1-0) limited St. John (0-1) to 18 yards of total offense (9 yards rushing and 9 yards passing).
Meanwhile, the Eagles sacked St. John’s quarterback five times, and Central Catholic defensive back Jalen Johnson, a University of Louisiana at Lafayette commitment, intercepted him once. Johnson picked off another pass and returned it for a touchdown, but the play was negated by a pass interference penalty.
The Eagles’ defense also recovered a fumble.
“I thought the defense did a great job,” Central Catholic coach Tommy Minton said. “I thought we shut them down. When you look at the big picture, we did a lot of good things. We got to get better at a lot of things.”
Offensively, Central Catholic got three touchdowns from running back Chris Singleton, who rushed 13 times for 85 yards.
Teammate Bailey Badeaux led the Eagles’ ground attack with 17 carries for 113 yards. He scored a touchdown, but it was negated by a penalty.
Central Catholic totaled 282 yards, 238 of those coming on the ground.
The Eagles scored touchdowns on their first two drives of the game. Singleton scored from 3 yards out with 9:41 remaining in the opening quarter and again on the Eagles’ second drive on a 13-yard run with 5:08 remaining in the opening quarter.
Central Catholic led 14-0 after a quarter and added a touchdown late in the first half when quarterback Blake Byrne rushed for a 5-yard score with 33 seconds remaining.
The play was set up by a Byrne connection with wide receiver Greg Leger for 44 yards down to the St. John 5-yard line. Byrne completed 1 of 5 passes in the game for 44 yards. Leger had the lone reception in the game, a reception for 44 yards.
Drake Angeron, who was 4-for-4 on extra points, converted the PAT through for the 21-0 lead.
Central Catholic added its final touchdown on its opening drive of the third quarter when Singleton scored on an 18-yard run with 6:58 remaining in the third quarter.
The Eagles got another score with 9:28 remaining in the contest via a safety for the final margin.
“Coach Minton does a great job. … He’s always done a great job,” St. John Coach Woody Cagnolatti said. “He got those ready to play. They’re a very, very good football team. …. We were excited about coming play that team. That’s a very good test for us. It’s going to get us ready down the road to compete against the guys in our district. It’s going to get us ready to compete whenever we get to the playoffs if we get a chance to get there at the end of the year.”
Cagnolatti said his team simply needs to improve.
“We just got to stay focused, stay the course, trust the process and win the games that we (are) supposed to win, and hopefully somewhere down the road, we’ll knock off somebody that we (are) not supposed to beat and it’ll help us push toward that playoff that we’re looking for,” Cagnolatti said.
Central Catholic will return to action Sept. 8 when it hosts Class 2A Opelousas Catholic in a nondistrict contest.

CCHS SJHS
First Downs 13 6
Rushing yards 238 9
Passing yards 44 9
Total yards 282 18
A-C-HI 1-6-0 3-1-1
Penalty yards 2-25 5-25
Fumbles-lost 2-1 4-1

Score by Quarters
CCHS 14 7 7 2 — 30
SJHS 0 0 0 0 — 0

Scoring Summary
First Quarter
CCHS: Chris Singleton 3-yd. run. (Drake Angeron kick) 9:41
CCHS: Singleton 13-yd. run. (Angeron kick) 5:08

Second Quarter
CCHS: Blake Byrne 5-yd. run. (Angeron kick) 0:33

Third Quarter
CCHS: Singleton 18-yd. run. (Angeron kick) 6:58

Fourth Quarter
CCHS: Safety. 9:28 m

CCHS Individual Stats
Rushing
Bailey Badeaux, 17-113; Chris Singleton, 13-85, 3 TDs; Blake Byrne, 5-17; DeDe Gant, 2-14; Davidyione Bias, 2-14; Greg Leger, 1-3; Team, 1-(-8).

Passing
Blake Byrne, 1-6-0, 44 yds., 0 TD

Receiving
Greg Leger, 1-44