Week 3 Takeaways: Livonia Franklin Beats Farmington 31-13 Behind Zyaire Lanier

The Farmington Falcons made the trip to face off against the Livonia Franklin Patriots for the first time since the 2015 playoffs and for the first time as new conference rivals. For Franklin, they entered the game after their worst loss in years last week to Walled Lake Western, 58-7, but Farmington was coming in at 2-0 after beating Walled Lake Northern 28-7. Could Franklin bounce back, or would Farmington move to 3-0? It would be Franklin coming away with the 31-13 victory.

Farmington Falcons

Rough Night

It was a rough night for the Falcons all around. To start, they were without senior Myles Smith in this one as he was seen in street clothes on the sideline, and that was a big missing piece to their team as they couldn’t get much pressure on Franklin, and it seemed like something was missing from their offense.

Add on to that the benching of their starting quarterback, and it wasn’t a great Saturday night for the Falcons.

Backup No More?

While they did have to bench their starting quarterback, the backup Newton Brown got the team moving in the right direction and even made the game more competitive. Brown finished the night 7-for-15 for 92 yards and led his team on some long drives.

While he was able to lead his team on long drives after he came into the game midway through the second quarter, he faced heavy pressure, including being knocked out of the game right before halftime due to an injury. He came back in the second half and fought hard until the end.

Franklin Patriots

Bounce Back

After dropping the game to Walled Lake Western last Friday, 58-7, the Patriots bounced back in a big way, winning this one 31-13. How were they able to bounce back in this one? They established the run game early and leaned on it all game as they mainly used the combination of Brody Gross, Jake Kotrych, and Zyaire Lanier to carry the ball and carry them to victory.

Zyaire Takes Flight

Zyaire Lanier was a man on a mission in the game vs. Farmington. In the game, the team scored four touchdowns. Zyaire had three of those touchdowns. Not only did Zyaire score three touchdowns, he rushed for 177 yards on 23 carries, which is good for 7.7 yards a carry, and that helped his team control the ball, clock, and tempo of the game.

Bear’s Final Take

While it’s still early in the season, there isn’t much to worry about for either team.

For Farmington, it just felt like everything that could go wrong did go wrong for their team, and add on the fact they didn’t have arguably their best player in Myles Smith, it was just too much in this one.

Franklin had a sour taste in their mouth following the loss last week, and being back at home in front of a packed-out stadium gave them what they needed to put last week behind them heading into a crosstown showdown next week against Livonia Stevenson.