Athlete Spotlight: Farren Davis
 Farren Davis
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 Drury High SeniorNo. 36 Tailback/linebacker |
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| When did you start playing football? Age 7 What was your first football team? Brattleboro (Vt.) Generals (Pioneer Valley Pop Warner League) Favorite football player: Marshall Faulk, St. Louis Rams Favorite football team? St. Louis Rams Best memory of playing football so far? 'Probably beating Hoosac last year. It was the first time I played a whole game and really felt part of the whole experience.' What's one thing about you people wouldn't know? 'In eighth or ninth grade, I took ballroom and swing dancing with my mom and grandma.' |
The Blue Devils' senior tailback answered any questions about his team's running game right off the bat, rushing for a game-high 127 yards and two touchdowns in Drury's season-opening 21-0 victory over Taconic. Davis' work on the ground, including a 150-yard effort against Mount Greylock, helped the Blue Devils win their first three games of the year before dropping a hard-fought 14-12 decision to Athol last weekend
While all three victories felt good, the win against Taconic was extra special for Drury, which has lost two very close games to the Braves over the past two years.
"We worked really hard all week during practice and really had a good feeling in our stomach heading into the game," Davis said. "I felt like there was a fire inside us, and we really wanted to get a win for coach [Bill] Bryce in his first game."
It appears that Bryce, who took over the head coaching duties after serving as an assistant under John Allen last year, had his team ready to play in the season opener.
"I think the coaches instilled in us that some people weren't expecting us to do much this year," Davis said. "I read on MassLive that some people were expecting us to be 2-6 this year, and I heard one paper had us losing 28-6 to Taconic. That really inspired us to work really hard leading up to the game."
Although Drury dominated the game in the first half on a recent Saturday, outgaining the Braves 145-15 in total yards, the Blue Devils weren't able to put points on the board until Davis ripped off a 34-yard touchdown run with just over seven minutes left in the third quarter.
"The whole first half we struggled once we got near the red zone," Davis said. "We got there, but then we kind of gave up on ourselves and just assumed we were going to score. My touchdown run was honestly the best blocked play of the game. I got through the hole and it kind of opened right up. The line did such a good job of executing that play, that it was kind of an easy run for me."
That run put Davis over the 100-yard mark, and he would cap his day off with an eight-yard TD run five minutes later that gave Drury a 13-0 lead. It was the first time in his career that Davis went over 100 yards on the ground.
"I think I had 96 in the Hoosac game last year, so it's been in the back of my mind and I've been looking forward to a 100-yard game," Davis said. "The coaches always post our stats up after the game, so it felt really good to see it up there and to read about it in the paper the next day."
