Murphy’s Law is becoming the rule for Vicksburg’s season so far.

Anything that can go wrong has.

Friday’s disappointing 34-7 blowout by visiting Richwood (La.) was made even more so as the Gators (0-2) were in the contest for two quarters, down 14-7 at the half. They were outscored 20-0 in the second half.

“We let it get away from us,” Vicksburg coach Alonzo Stevens said. “We’ve got to fight harder. We didn’t wrap up at times. Once we stopped all of their gadgets they had, they went plain, old smashmouth, ‘here I come, here you come, you stop me, I’ll stop you.’ We didn’t rise to the occasion.”

In the second half, the Rams (1-0) went back to basics, running just a few different plays through the teeth of the Vicksburg defense.

The strategy was a simple one. You know what we’re running. Stop it if you can.

The Gators couldn’t and wilted badly under the physical onslaught.

Richwood backs rushed 13 times in the second half for 179 yards, an astronomic 13.7 yards per rush. The Ram offensive line dominated the Gators’ front seven, allowing backs Rob Emerson — six carries for 107 yards in the second half — and Antonio Wilson — five carries for 71 yards — to both eclipse the 100-yard mark by the end of the third quarter. Emerson finished with 179 yards on 12 carries with one score. Wilson totaled 112 yards on the ground and scored on runs of 44 and 20 yards in the second half.

Richwood quarterback Andrick Mitchell, who was plagued by drops by his receivers in the first half, got a comfortable rhythm in the second half. He completed all four of his attempts for 78 yards, a big improvement after completing only 2 of 10 passes for 47 yards and an interception in the first.

“It was very, very sloppy,” Richwood coach Warren Trimble said of the first half. “We’ve got a very young team. We settled down and were able to do some things. We’ve got our work cut out for us.”

Vicksburg was its own worst enemy on special teams. Both Lamar Anthony and Adam Reed had huge returns negated by block in the back penalties. Reed’s kickoff return for a TD could’ve been a huge shift in momentum after Richwood took the lead at 8-7, but instead, the Gators were backed up deep by the penalty.

Anthony’s long punt return could’ve set the Gators up in fine field position, but again, a boneheaded penalty backed the Gators up and sealed their fate.

“You make big plays and you hurt yourself,” Stevens said. “We’ve got to stop that. It was nowhere near the play. That’s just selfish.”

Another area Stevens would like to see a drastic improvement is pass catching. Junior quarterback Cameron Cooksey completed only 11-of-31 passes and, while a few of them were bad throws, the vast majority were drops of catchable balls. Tight end Demonta Gaines went his second straight game without a reception and Stevens still wants to get his big, athletic tight end involved in the passing game.

“We dropped too many passes and dropped passes kill your momentum,” Stevens said. “We had far too many passes hit people in the hands. He (Cooksey) threw some wild ones, but he threw some good ones.”

One thing that went right was the hard running of Kawayne Gaston. He rushed for 16 times for 65 yards, the best rushing performance by a Vicksburg back this season.

“That No. 28 (Gaston) is a special back,” Trimble said. “We contained him, somewhat.”