The Bearcats lost their final game of the season to Sun Valley by a score of 44-20 on Friday night.
Anson quarterback D’Angelo Tyson was injured early in the first quarter, putting the Bearcats at a disadvantage from the beginning. With 3:21 left in the first quarter, the Spartans made their first touchdown and extra point. They punched in a second score with only 32 seconds in the quarter.
The Bearcats got on the scoreboard with only 15 seconds left in the first quarter when Reginald Dunlap made a touchdown. The team’s attempt at a two-point conversion was no good, leaving the score at 14-6 in the Spartans’ favor.
Damoentay Horne passed the ball to Octavian Harrell for a second touchdown more than halfway into the second quarter. The team managed a two-point conversion, putting the Bearcats just behind Sun Valley at 14-12.
The gap widened again when the Spartans made another touchdown, with a little over two minutes left in the second quarter, though the Bearcats blocked the Spartans’ extra point. Two minutes later, Sun Valley made another touchdown and two-point conversion that put the Spartans ahead of the Bearcats by 28-12.
With only 17 seconds left in the first half, Tavion Rorie scored another Anson touchdown. The Bearcats tried again for a two-point conversion but failed, putting them behind Sun Valley 28-18.
Fifteen seconds later, the Spartans found their way to paydirt and tacked on a two-point conversion to head into the locker room with a 36-18 halftime advantage.
In the third quarter, the Bearcats scored a safety, though neither team managed a touchdown, making the score 36-20 in Sun Valley’s favor.
The Spartans scored another touchdown five minutes into the final quarter, following up with a successful two-point conversion. The Bearcats couldn’t recover, ending the game with Sun Valley winning 44-20.
Coach’s thoughts
Tyson’s early injury was a huge blow for Anson, but Coach Ralph Jackson said his team rallied to carry on.
“When D’Angelo went down, it pretty much changed the game plan,” he said. “When Damoentay Horne goes in, he does everything he was asked to do. He hadn’t done it all year, so he put team before self. Yes, it’s a loss, but the life lesson is better than anything that could’ve come out of this game. To see those guys, and they were highly upset and hurt and irate, but they were able to regain their control and finish the game.”
Jackson said he had not received a report on Tyson’s injuries Friday, but he hopes Tyrson will be fully recovered in time for basketball season.
“I appreciate everything that he did for us this season,” Jackson said. “For D’Angelo, an athlete playing for us in a quarterback position for us, he did what I asked him to do, no matter what mistakes he made throughout the season on the field. I appreciate his effort, because that is doing something that you’re not comfortable with. It’s easy to lose your comfort zone and give up, and he didn’t. So a lot of respect for him, and a lot of respect for all of these guys that finished the season.”
After the game, the two teams met on the field to pray.
“To pray with another team that we hadn’t played with, that we hadn’t done anything with other than met tonight, that says a lot about the character of these young men,” Jackson said. “It has improved and that’s something that we’ve been working on, it’s something that we believe in, and it’s something that we’re going to stick by. Because we’re not just developing football players, we’re developing men.”
Next season, Jackson said he wants the team to become “smarter football players.”
“We have to become better people, and then we have to become better football players,” Jackson said. “So situational football we have to improve, understanding where we are, those things there, that is the cerebral part of football, and we have to become better cerebral thinkers.”
Overall, Jackson predicts, the team will continue the “return to dominance” that he has pushed for all year.
“We’ve got to get stronger, and we’ve got to get faster, and we’re going do more things as far as team-building,” Jackson said. “So our goal next year is to be the most dominant team on the field.”
Reach reporter Imari Scarbrough at 704-994-5471 and follow her on Twitter @ImariScarbrough.
