Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, December 12, 1993 TAG: 9312120145
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: D-1 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: BY BOB TEITLEBAUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: FAIRFAX LENGTH: Long
Annandale upset Pulaski County 14-7, ending a 21-game Cougars winning streak and denying them back-to-back Group AAA Division 6 state titles.
The Atoms won the state championship by stopping a late threat after Pulaski County (13-1) seemed ready to come off the deck and land a knockout punch.
Even without junior running back and defensive end Eric Webb, the Cougars had opportunities. Webb, who suffered a broken jaw against Indian River in a state semifinal, did not play against Annandale.
Carl Lewis, asked to do more than usual because of Webb's absence, ran 29 times for 138 yards. Most of that yardage came in the final 26 minutes.
Annandale (13-1) stopped Pulaski County early. The Atoms' linebacking corps, led by Maurice Daniels, held the Cougars to one first down on their first seven possessions.
"I want to be fair to the Annandale team," said Joel Hicks, Pulaski County's coach. "We couldn't block down on their linebackers. Eric is experienced and used to doing it."
So the Cougars adjusted, going to drive blocking rather than trap blocking. That tactic worked, but only after Annandale had taken a 14-0 lead.
The Atoms did all of their scoring in the second quarter. They missed two big opportunities in the opening quarter. The first came when the Atoms drove to the Cougars' 4-yard line after Lewis fumbled on the game's third play. Pulaski's John Lilly thwarted that scoring threat by blocking a field-goal attempt.
After dodging that bullet, the Cougars got into another jam. Derrick Crittenden returned a punt to the Pulaski 27 after Billy Ingles got off his best kick of the day, a 35-yarder, into a stiff, cold breeze that played havoc with both teams.
Pulaski County's defense was up to the task again. On fourth down, Annandale quarterback Jon McPhail rolled out to pass and was thrown for a 1-yard loss by Larry Newcomb.
In the second quarter, disaster struck for the Cougars. After an Ingles punt was blown sideways and went only 9 yards, McPhail hit Christian Segaar on the left sideline.
Timmy Davis was with Segaar but missed the pass and was on the ground as the Annandale receiver went 54 yards for a touchdown.
"We had gotten the wind and felt we had to take a shot at it," said Dick Adams, Annandale's coach.
Davis, who has been one of the Cougars' top players in the playoffs, said he looked inside and all of a sudden the receiver went outside.
"He got 3 or 4 yards on me," David said. "I had to play the ball, but I really should have played the receiver."
"You run it inside to the post and then you flag it out," Segaar said. "The wind helped the ball even though it was well-thrown, but it didn't have a good spiral on it. I came inside of him when he was watching the quarterback and he wasn't watching me."
On Pulaski's next series, the Cougars got their first break when they recovered a fumble at midfield following a short punt by Ingles.
Annandale, though, got the ball back when Pulaski quarterback Andre Eaves fumbled to the Atoms' Ernest Amankwah, who returned the ball to the Cougars' 12. Eric Jennings blasted over from the 3-yard line two plays later as Annandale made it 14-0.
At that point, Pulaski had gone nowhere offensively. Before intermission, however, the trend changed.
Lewis, who had 12 yards rushing, picked up 34 yards before the teams went to the locker rooms. The Cougars continued to gain ground in the second half, although they didn't score immediately. Pulaski, with Lewis running, drove to the Atoms' 18, but its drive stalled.
"We weren't blocking," Hicks said. "Annandale had put a good defense on us. I didn't know whether that or Eric not playing was going through the kids' minds."
"I wasn't getting tired, and the linemen were doing a good job of blocking," Lewis said.
Hicks then changed from a trap-blocking offense to drive blocking, and the Atoms' linebackers were almost neutralized by the new Cougars scheme.
"We knew their formations and keyed on them," Daniels said. "I had watched films on them every day. Then they started to run stuff they ran last year, things we hadn't seen on our films. They led their backs with a tight end and wing on that side."
Something else also started working. The crisscross play, unstoppable when Webb ran it, was in moth balls for much of the game. Ingles, filling in as a runner for Webb, mistimed the play a couple of times. Then, the timing came and so did the yardage.
Pulaski moved 53 yards on a drive in the final quarter. Ingles ran 11 yards on the crisscross but fumbled at the Atoms' 1. Davis recovered in the end zone for a touchdown as the Cougars closed to 14-7 with 5 minutes, 34 seconds left.
"I saw the ball, but I didn't know whether it would be a touchdown," Davis said. "I thought Billy was down."
Pulaski's defense gave it one more shot. Chris Lawson hit McPhail and jarred the ball loose, and Jammon Payne recovered for Pulaski at the Atoms' 36 with 3:23 left.
"I told our guys to keep their heads up, that if they could score 12 points [two touchdowns] in the first half, we could do it in the second half," Eaves said.
After Ingles ran 12 yards on the crisscross, the Atoms' defense stiffened. Four plays netted 8 yards, with Eaves halted for a 2-yard gain on fourth-and-four at the Annandale 24.
"We started running trap plays," Eaves said of the Cougars' decision to go with their bread-and-butter attack before Webb's injury.
"We felt we had to mix it up, that they were adjusting to our drive blocking," said Hicks of the failed opportunity to tie the score and force overtime.
by CNB