The 7-3A Conference Knights benefited from two turnovers by the 3-2A Bears that ended possessions in the red zone. The last came after a throw by quarterback Jaxon Smith, who had spearheaded an exciting drive that began deep in the Bears own territory after a succession of penalties. Before the turnover, he had completed a long pass for big yardage against a Knights team whose defensive line routinely broke through the Bears’ protection to send Smith scrambling.
The over capacity Bears’ home crowd was roaring throughout the game. There were two lead changes after the Bears began the game with a 6-0 lead after a Smith quarterback keeper and a failed conversion attempt. The Bears struck again with a spectacular 53-yard touchdown pass to make the lead 12-0.
The Knights mounted a long drive in the second quarter, with run sweeps, and completions, getting on the scoreboard with a running touchdown and a successful two-point conversion to make it 12-8.
After starting out at the ten, the Bears started a long drive with many heroic running and passing plays. But on second and seven at the Knights’ twelve, the Bears gave up a fumble that the Knights recovered and took 88 yards to the endzone, taking the 14-12 lead, but failing their conversion attempt.
Receiving the kickoff and bringing it to their own 33, Spring Hill got another long-pass completion and then run that the Knights only managed to stop at their own 32. Next, another passing play got the Bears even closer to paydirt. On first and ten from the 15, the pass was incomplete in the endzone. On second and ten, the next pass, also aiming for a Bear in the endzone was intercepted by a Centerpoint defensive back. For the Bears it was another missed opportunity for points and another turnover. The score would remain Centerpoint 14 and Spring Hill 12 at halftime.
Spring Hill would hold Centerpoint to one first down and then a three and out on its first possession of the second half, then start its drive at its own 44, converting a fourth-and-two to get the ball to the Knights’ 34. In the next play there was a fumble on a pitch-attempt but Spring Hill recovered. The Bears’ last touchdown was on a Jaxon Smith keeper from the 14. The conversion attempt failed but the Bears had retaken the lead, 18-14.
On the next drive, the Bears were driven back with a lot of hard running from Centerpoint. On a first and goal, the Bears stood up for two downs but a leap over the pile from the Knights’ running back claimed the last go-ahead touchdown for Centerpoint and the score was 22-18.
From there, Spring Hill got a good series going that included a conversion on fourth and fifteen with a complete pass to Karson Hamilton that got the Bears to the 50. But on a fourth-and-five three plays later at the 45, the Knights proved themselves more than ready for a hurry-up snap and met the ballcarrier at the line for a short loss. The Bears had turned it over on downs.
The Bears were not finished fighting, though, forcing the Knights into a fourth-and-three with their coach deciding to go for it, failing and then giving up the ball for their own turnover on downs late in the fourth quarter.
The Bears offense, given a chance at the lead with 46 seconds left, beat itself up with two penalties, pinning the team back to its own 35. Yet the fight was still on, with completing a long one that was run to the Knights’ 35 and then downing the ball with 22 seconds remaining. The next play was the interception. The Knights were penalized after for excessive celebration, but this posed no danger for the victory formation that ran out the clock.
After the game, Spring Hill Coach Greg Smith could be heard urging his team to avoid fingerpointing and focus on team unity. When asked for his assessment of the game and his team’s performance he said, “It was exciting. We kept it close. But we shot ourselves in the foot too much offensively, left our defense out there too long. We’ve got a bunch of young kids that are still learning how to do things. We're not playing a lot of older guys, and that's part of it.
“But when we make the mistakes we make offensively and put all that pressure on the defense, that's tough. We're a young defense too, so we just have to clean up our mistakes. You can't have that many turnovers. You just really can't. As we got deep into the game, we started doing smarter things with the football, getting it out of bounds, things like that, making better decisions back there. We’ve just got to understand what a ball on the ground means. We'll take care of the football. We'll be fine. “
