Jeremy Hill led Hillsboro with 82 yards rushing.

Oakland stumbled out of the gates Friday at Hillsboro, coughing the ball up on each of its first three possessions, but the Patriots eventually rebounded to capture a 36-28 win over the host Burros.

Hillsboro (1-1), which entered the game ranked first in Class 5A, jumped out to a 14-0 first-quarter lead thanks to a pair of Patriot fumbles.

“Early season mistakes,” said first-year Oakland coach Kevin Creasy, who notched his first win with this new school on Friday. “It’s not if you’re going to make early season mistakes, it’s about how you’re going to react to them. I’m proud of our guys for fighting back.

It didn’t take long for Oakland to turn things around, as Brendon Matthews hooked up with Cameron Massengill on a 73-yard touchdown pass on the first play of the second quarter — the first of four unanswered Patriot scores.

“It’s one of those funny things about football,” Creasy said. “A lot of times games are won and lost by who makes the fewest mistakes, and we had so much going wrong that we needed someone to make a play.”

“It definitely riled up everybody and got everybody back on track,” added Matthews. ”We battled through some adversity early on and we responded.”

Oakland (1-1) pulled to within 14-12 on Matthews’ 3-yard touchdown run with 5:16 left in the half, and the Patriots took their first lead of the contests on Matthews’ second rushing score of the night — this from 6 yards out.

The Burros, whose first two scoring drives went for a combined 34 yards, managed just three first downs in the first half.

“After watching the tape I knew we had some matchup problems with their defensive front,” Hillsboro coach Craig Clayton said. “I knew we were going to struggle to run the ball, especially with (running back Deandre) Alexander out.”

Senior running back Jeremy Hill finished with 82 yards on 20 carries for Hillsboro, while junior quarterback Daylon Murphy completed 13 of 22 pass attempts for 246 yards with two touchdowns and three interceptions.

“We threw the ball more than we wanted to throw it,” Clayton said. “We’re asking him to do a lot more than we should. He just doesn’t have a lot of game experience, which is why we want to bring him on slow. But they did what I would have done — brought pressure and tried to shake him up.”

Murphy, who fired touchdown passes of 24 and 96 yards, was sacked seven times in the loss.

Reach Michael Murphy at 615-259-8262 and on Twitter @Murph_TNsports.