Taylor knew their non-district schedule wouldn’t be easy.

The Mustangs went through a grueling two game stretch leading into district, playing Cy-Woods and George Ranch. The Mustangs were competitive last week and were again this week before faltering in the second half on Thursday and falling to the Longhorns 41-15, going to 0-2 on the year.

“That was a key for us going into this year, and even though we’ve had two hard losses we feel we can grow from this” said Taylor head coach Chad Simmons. “You can play teams you feel you match up favorably against, but then that wouldn’t challenge you and we wanted that challenge. We were in last weeks game until the very end and even though we weren’t with this one there wasn’t any quit with those kids. I think it was really important to play those kind of teams because that’s what you face in our district from top to bottom.”

Taylor was able to stay in the game throughout the first half. Jackson Waller put the Mustangs ahead by nailing a 22-yard field goal on the teams first drive of the game, but George Ranch came back and took the lead on a 29-yard pass from Deion Drinkard to Kurveon McNeil halfway through the second quarter, before George Ranch scored again just seconds later on an interception return for a touchdown. George Ranch went into halftime with a 14-3 lead.

Taylor got back into things early in the second half. Josiah Rodriguez intercepted a George Ranch pass on the Longhorns first possession of the second half and returned it inside the 10-yard line, which Taylor took advantage of with a 3-yard touchdown pass to Dante Archie.

But George Ranch took over from there, scoring two touchdowns on big runs in the third quarter and another on a short run before sealing the game in the fourth with another touchdown run.

“The positive we can take from this game as a defense is we forced a lot of takeaways and we got them off the field on fourth down,” said senior safety and team captain Cyrus Reyes. “But that’s not good enough, we have to lock in at practice and get better, especially at limiting the big plays. That’s something that hurt us tonight and we have to get better at stopping moving forward.”

Bruns, who came in at quarterback in the second half after an injury to starter Joshua Higginbotham, was able to settle in down the stretch and got a second touchdown midway through the fourth quarter for the Mustangs third score of the game. Taylor fought until the final whistle and even shorthanded never gave George Ranch anything.

“This really prepared us and now it’s up to us to take these losses, learn from them and get better,” Reyes said. “That’s the goal, we can’t dwell on the losses or be down on ourselves, we have to be ready and continue to get better.”

Taylor will face off against Cinco Ranch to start district play. The Mustangs already are dealing with bumps and bruises and will have to have a next man up mentality going into the week, but that is something that has already been instilled in the program since Simmons got there, and he knows the players are up to the task.

“One of the things we talked about after the game is that we know there’s some guys out right now and we have to compensate for it,” Simmons said. “The next guys have to step up and we can’t let that or these losses define our season and our team. These guys are fighters and they’re going to work to define themselves and make it a message of getting back on track after these two games. We didn’t like these two games, but the next one is when they count. It’s all about learning from these two weeks and being ready for next week against Cinco.”

George Ranch 41, Taylor 15

First quarter

T: Jackson Waller 22 field goal, 8:56

Second quarter

GR: Deion Drinkard 29 pass to Kurveon McNeil (Josh Matula kick) 5:15

GR Cade Marino 34 interception return (Matula kick) 4:58

Third quarter

T: Daniel Bruns 3 pass to Dante Archie, 7:19

GR: Jaden Shelton 69 run (Matula kick) 7:03

GR: Shelton 40 run (Matula kick) 3:58

GR: Drinkard 2 run, 1:58

Fourth quarter

GR: Hayden Drinkard 12 run (Matula kick) 11:01

T: Daniel Bruns 4 run, 6:56

Team stats

Individual Statistics

Rushing – Taylor: Ethan Jacobson, 16-64; Dante Archie, 3-36; Josh Jacobson, 7-3; Joshua Hugginbotham, 1-0; Joe Praise Adeyemi, 2-(-1)Daniel Bruns, 3-(-16)-1;  George Ranch: Jaden Shelton, 14-149-2; Hayden Drinkard, 10-48-1; Deion Drinkard, 5-19; Dylan Smith, 2-3;

Passing – Taylor: Joshua Higginbotham, 8-17-41-0-1; Daniel Bruns, 6-15-57-1-0; George Ranch: Deion Drinkard, 7-10-81-1-1;

Receiving – Taylor: Ethan Jacobson, 3-37; Cyrus Reyes, 2-20; Matthais Young, 2-17; Dante Archie, 2-9; Tristen Chambers, 1-8; Josh Jacobson, 4-7; George Ranch: Kurveon McNeil, 4-54-1; Hayden Drinkard, 2-13; Desi Drinkard, 1-11; Julius Carter, 1-3;