EAGLEVILLE, Tenn. – Nate Zimmerman ran for a season-high 137 yards and three touchdowns, Isaac Rimes came through with a scoop-and-score, and the Cascade Champions (3-1) led wire-to-wire in a 43-20 victory at Eagleville (2-2) in a non-region battle on Friday night.

Cascade’s Sam Bradley finished 12-of-22 with 161 yards passing and one interception, but where he did the most damage was on the ground with his legs. The senior quarterback ran 10 times for 105 yards and two touchdowns to complement his senior tailback, Nate Zimmerman, who rushed for 137 yards and three touchdowns on 22 attempts. Through the air, Braxtyn Burris led all Champion receivers with three receptions for 66 yards.

Early on, Zimmerman opened the scoring with a rushing touchdown at the 7:26 mark of the first quarter. After a successful two-point conversion, Cascade held an 8-0 lead.

On the ensuing Eagleville possession, the Champions’ defense found a way to score its second touchdown of this young season when Isaac Rimes picked up a fumble and ran it into the end zone to give Cascade a 15-0 lead with 6:29 remaining in the first quarter.

The Eagles were able to settle down enough to respond with a Carter Blair touchdown early in the second quarter after both teams traded punts, trimming the lead to 15-8 after a successful two-point conversion.

Both teams again traded possessions before Bradley was intercepted, but an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty against Eagleville’s offense knocked them out of scoring range and ultimately gave the ball back to Cascade. The Champions finally put another scoring drive together, taking 3:26 off the clock and punctuating the march with a Zimmerman touchdown run with 21 seconds left in the half. Cascade held a 23-8 lead heading into the halftime locker room.

Eagleville, aided by a successful fake punt on fourth down, opened up the second half with a touchdown drive, ending with a two-yard touchdown run by Benton Fox. However, the two-point conversion was unsuccessful, keeping the score at 23-14 with 5:09 to go in the third quarter.

Cascade responded with another long touchdown drive, taking nearly six minutes off the clock and ending with a Bradley touchdown run with 11:21 left in the fourth quarter to take a 29-14 lead.

Bradley quickly found the end zone two minutes later on another run to put the game away at 36-14 with under nine minutes remaining.

Fox got into the end zone with 3:35 left for the Eagles to trim the lead to 16 points, 36-20, but Zimmerman tacked on one final touchdown run on the ensuing Cascade possession to put the final nail in the Eagleville coffin with 1:21 remaining in the fourth quarter.

Cascade improves to 3-1 overall. The Champions open Region 4-AAA play at home on Friday night against Sequatchie County with kickoff set for 7:00 p.m.