By Carl Holcomb
Moorefield Examiner
Cameron slowly stirred the cauldron as East Hardy simmered to the lead, then the Dragons breathed fire into the coals scorching the Cougars on Halloween 8-7 to shake up the playoff hunt and spoil senior night.
A win of this magnitude could lock in a first round playoff home game, but there is one more ranked opponent ahead for each team this Friday.
Class A No. 8 East Hardy (5-4) will travel to Class AA No. 11 Petersburg this Friday, while Class A No. 7 Cameron hosts Class A No. 5 Pendleton County.
It was a defensive battle all night as both teams only managed to reach the end zone one time apiece.
East Hardy honored the seniors prior to the game, then it was time to get to work.
“These seniors mean a lot to me. I know it’s not a big group, but all these guys embody what East Hardy is supposed to be about. They play their hearts out and they are our best players. We need them to bring us home here down the stretch. Petersburg is our next biggest team to finish the season. We should be able to win that game. It will be close, but we need our leaders to step up. We are in the playoffs and in the same situation as we were this week. We’ve got to capitalize. To be so close, then commit so many penalties is what beats us this year. Whenever we lose a ball game, the worst thing that comes out is penalties. For us to play a clean game would put us in a position to be a more confident team. That is our focus this week and it was lacking this week,” East Hardy coach Devon Orndorff commented.
“Whenever your defense only gives up eight points, you’ve got to be happy for that. The problem was our offense tonight. I thought we had the huge advantage in the box, especially when we hit those big passes and got them in a cover-two forward look and they dropped the safeties back. We had the bigger line, but they were able to beat us with speed. We have to capitalize on each situation. The summary at the end of night is that we committed over 120 yards in penalties and still should have won the game. It’s no more obvious than that. When our offense stalled, we turned the switch and would play really good defense. We had some good red zone defense and had a blocked punt. We had several opportunities, but our offense needs to do better.”
The Cougars thrashed ahead in the first quarter on a sensational 85-yard touchdown strike from junior quarterback Trevor Roof to senior Levi Price.
Price caught the pass just beyond midfield and stopped dead in his tracks to juke a Cameron defender, then made two others fall in his wake and hopped into the end zone out of reach of a diving Dragons defender at the 3:29 mark and added the kick for good measure for a 7-nil advantage.
The Dragons responded early in the second quarter as Talen Brown rushed for pay dirt inside the red zone and the two-point conversion was made to put Cameron up 8-7.
“I expected a close match, absolutely. We watched these guys on film. Obviously, we are ranked seventh and they are ranked eighth. We knew it was going to be a battle. We knew it would come down to the last play. We were ready for a battle and my defensive coordinator preached to them all week that every play matters. We also have to stay positive, because they are going to make plays. This is a game of give and take and fortunately we came out one point ahead. Our offensive coordinator made a few adjustments to take advantage of what we did well earlier in the game. The kids understood the instruction and made the plays. We had been getting stonewalled on some plays, but started to pick up a few yards and carried the momentum. The kids believe in themselves and are coming into their own. We knew the tendencies and were able to take some of their opportunities away. They had that one big play down the middle against us. I give all the credit to my defensive coordinator Derek Martin,” Cameron coach Tim Brown stated.
“Marshall is a great kid. He came to our school last year and it was too late for him to play football, but he came and hung out with us. He has great grades. The team is all like brothers and they accepted him right away. He loves it here and works so hard. He earned that 1,000 yards. He was a blocking back most of the game, so he is unselfish and does a lot of great things for the team.”
Penalties and missed opportunities spelled doom for the Cougars throughout the night, but the defense managed to keep the Dragons from striking again.
East Hardy had possession fighting an uphill battle with four minutes remaining, but Garrett Van Meter found an opening into Dragons territory.
The Cougars managed to get down to the edge of the red zone with a fourth down looming and three minutes to go in the game.
East Hardy called a timeout and decided to attempt a 37-yard potential game-winning field goal, but the surefooted Price missed just wide.
The Cougars defense went to work and a huge stop for no gain by Van Meter helped forced a Cameron punt with just over a minute remaining.
However, a deadfall personal foul penalty would back East Hardy to its own 27-yard line.
After three passes went awry with the Cougars facing fourth down, Roof scrambled towards the sideline and connected with Dayton Dove for a first down catch at midfield with a tip-toe landing on the edge of the sideline.
East Hardy failed to connect again as the Dragons fired up the pressure forcing a turnover on downs to seal the win.
One special highlight came for Cameron’s Marshall Holland surpassing 1,000 career rushing yards.
“If I am going to be honest, a year ago I was thinking about quitting football since I didn’t have many playing opportunities. A friend asked me to come out to a practice and I loved it and have played ever since. I love all these guys. It means a lot for them to help me reach this goal. My center Colin Magers, every time he pulls, I have the confidence to make a positive gain. We have the speed, once we get out there. [Defense] Effort, all I can say is effort. 100 percent effort,” Cameron’s Marshall Holland noted.
East Hardy and Cameron live to fight another day and hope to secure home field advantage for the playoffs with the season finales this week.
