Bears surf over Green Wave
Bland County (12) vs. Narrows (0)
Written: Oct 11, 2014
By BRIAN WOODSON
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
BASTIAN, Va. — It was wet, muddy and rainy ... a perfect football night for Dylan Jackson and the Bland County Bears.
In fact, Jackson wanted to keep playing even after the swift-moving two-hour game finished with the Bears claiming the “Battle of Wolf Creek” with a 12-0 win over Mountain Empire District rival Narrows on homecoming Friday night at the Bland County Sports Complex.
“I can run the ball some more,” said a smiling Jackson, who ran for 112 yards on 31 carries, serving the role of a ‘mudder’ just fine. “I love playing in the mud.”
Mason Christian scored on the first play of the game, a 60-yard touchdown run down the right sideline, and added a 6-yard scoring run later in the first quarter, which was all the Bears would need.
“That certainly helped, but sometimes that happens and the other team bounces back,” Bland County head coach Harris Hart said. “We kept playing hard and our defense just played great.”
Definitely. Bland County (3-3) limited Narrows (1-5) to 40 yards, including negative-7 yards in the opening half, and the Green Wave didn’t get the first of their three first downs until early in the third period.
“The defense played the best we have played in a long, long time,” Hart said. “I am not going to say years, but a long time. They tackled well, they stayed in their lanes and did their responsibilities, I am very pleased with that.”
“We just couldn’t get anything moving, especially in the first half,” added Narrows head coach Kelly Lowe. “We got a little bit of something going in the second half, but just couldn’t mount anything.”
These clubs have traditionally played competitive games, with the Green Wave now holding a 6-5 advantage since 2004, including a 7-6 win last year over the Bears.
“I love playing against Narrows,” Jackson said. “It feels great beating your rival. Going into homecoming week, celebrating it, getting ready to play Narrows, ended up beating them, that is always good.”
An already muddy field got muddier with a downpour in the second quarter, and it was still raining while Tori Smith was being crowned as homecoming queen during the break.
“I guess our principal was kind of considering because it was homecoming maybe postponing, but there is no guarantee tomorrow night or Monday is going to be any better so I think you are just better off to play,” Hart said. “I thought it might hurt actually because I felt we had a little bit more speed than they did, but our kids responded and played well.”
Bland County wasted no time getting on the board, with Christian faking the handoff into the line, and ran around the right side on the slippery grass, dashing down the right sideline to the end zone.
Just like that, the Bears were up 6-0, after the extra point was missed.
“That is a killer, put us behind the 8-ball right off the bat,” Lowe said. “In conditions like this it is hard to come back. It always hard to play in conditions like this, but I am not making any excuses, they had the same conditions we did and we just didn’t come out and make plays.”
That was followed by the first of five Narrows punts, and the Bears drove 13 plays and 64 yards, keyed by a 24-yard run on 4th and 3 by Isaiah Boyd to the 2. Two plays later, Christian was able to stick it in from the 6.
The two-point conversion run failed, leaving the score at 12-0 with 2:23 still left in the opening period.
“I felt like we left some points out here, especially in the first half,” Hart said. “We would get down close and bog down, which I was afraid might come back to hurt us, but fortunately it didn’t.”
That would be it for the Bears, which had other chances deep in Narrows’ territory, but wouldn’t score again.
“It is a fun atmosphere and I thought defensively we played well,” Lowe said. “We had a couple of breakdowns there in the first half, but I thought the defense played pretty good, but we have just got to put the full game together.”
Not on this night with the way the Bears played defense, especially in the opening half, forcing three punts and Dakota Wright picked off a pass attempt by Cole Blaker after he was hit while throwing the ball by Zachary Gwyn.
“Our defense has really came together since the first week of the season,” Jackson said. “We have put in a lot of hard work throughout the season and the coaches really help us out a lot. If it wasn’t for the coaches, we couldn’t have beaten Narrows.”
Narrows’ longest play from scrimmage in the opening half was 2 yards.
“We have just got to put drives together,” Lowe said. “We have got to get the chains moving, we can’t keep playing behind the chains. We have always got to play ahead of the chains and we didn’t do a very good job of that tonight.”
Neither team got any closer than the opposing 20-yard line — and that was once by Bland County — in the second half, with the Green Wave picking up three first downs, while the Bears kept feeding the 5-foot-8, 233-pound Jackson, and he kept chugging his way through the mud.
“He is low to the ground and runs hard,” Hart said. “He is a physical young man for a sophomore, very impressive.”
Bland County also received 54 yards rushing from Christian and Keith Miller, and another 41 by Boyd, who also had a second half interception on defense. Aaron Rose caught one pass for 28 yards.
“A great night, we needed it,” Hart said. “The kids had a lot of fun, and if they have a lot of fun, I have a lot of fun, it makes this job worthwhile.”
Narrows struggled throughout, with Drew Stowers rushing for 25 yards, and Blaker competing two passes for just three yards. Jeffrey Russ recovered a fumble for the Green Wave.
“It was real tough, hats off to Coach Hart and Bland, they played hard and they deserved to win,” said Lowe, whose Green Wave will visit Fort Chiswell next week. “We just couldn’t get it going, we will battle back and get ready for Fort Chiswell. They are going to be looking for a big win.”
Bland County will visit Grayson County on Friday, with the Blue Devils coming off their first win of the season against Graham.
“Very pleased, we will enjoy this certainly and come tomorrow we will start preparing for Grayson,” Hart said. “I don’t know much about them right now, but we will find out. We will get film on them tomorrow and we will start preparing and get ready for them.”
Perhaps, the same conditions will exist next week too. That would suit Jackson just fine.
“We just have to play hard every week, practice hard every week, play four quarters of football every week,” Jackson said. “Just don’t give up and play every Friday night.”
— E-mail Brian at
bwoodson@bdtonline.com
/ Twitter @bdtwoodson
at Bland County Sports Complex
Narrows......................0 0 0 0 — 0
Bland County............12 0 0 0 — 12
Scoring
First Quarter
BC—Mason Christian 60 run (kick failed) 11:45
BC—Christian 6 run (run failed) 2:23
Team Statistics
First downs: NR 3, BC 16. Rush-Yards: NR 23-37, BC 55-260. Pass yards: NR 3, BC 28. Comp-Att-Int: NR 6-2-2, BC 1-5-0. Total yards: NR 40, BC 288. Fumbles-Lost: NR 0-0, BC 2-1. Penalty-yards: NR 3-25, BC 8-53. Punts-Avg: NR 5-32.8, BC 1-29.
Individual Statistics
Rushing — NR Drew Stowers 7-25, Brandon Stowers 3-18, Jackson Blankenship 2-10, Bailey Snidow 3-1, Camden Honaker 1-1, Cole Blaker 6-(-18); BC Dylan Jackson 31-112, Mason Christian 9-54, Keith Miller 6-54, Isaiah Boyd 9-41.
Passing — NR Cole Blaker 6-2-2 int-3-0 td; BC Mason Christian 5-1-0 int-28-0 td.
Receiving — NR Cody Collins 1-2, Bailey Snidow 1-1; BC Aaron Rose 1-28.
Turnovers — NR Jeffrey Russ fr; BC Dakota Wright int, Isaiah Boyd int.
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