York Wins Wild One In 'Bird Battle'
York’s Ben Edwards, who scored two touchdowns in his team’s 35-34 victory over Jamestown on Saturday, gives his team one last boost of encouragement as he leaves the game after suffering a leg injury in the closing moments. It worked; Alex Johnston (below) threw a touchdown pass in overtime to clench the victory. Photos by Jason Norman
If York's 35-34 victory over visiting Jamestown on Saturday had been written as a script and sent to Hollywood for the next Disney-esque youth sports feel-good film, producers would probably consider it too unrealistic to bring to the screen.
Early on, the team's star quarterback gets stricken with a mysterious illness, and the squad falls behind. With his heart of a champion beating at high volume, the fellow brings his team back. But the other team grabs the momentum, and he can't go anymore, leaving the game in the hands of a newbie off the bench.
The second-in-command gets off to a rough start, and all seems lost. But at the very last second, he manages to complete a miraculous play that suddenly saves things for the squad. For York (2-0, 3-0) and its fans, truth was much better than fiction.
As he tried to navigate through one of the Bay Rivers District's toughest defenses, York quarterback Ben Edwards started feeling a bit off-kilter. He'd been fine before the game, but several of Edwards' teammates had found themselves afflicted with colds and other sicknesses throughout the week, and perhaps an unwelcome visitor was knocking on Edwards' door.
After Max Zaun put the Eagles (0-2, 1-2) on the board first with a 37-yard field goal early in the second quarter, Edwards rushed for 11 yards to the Falcon 37, then to the 46. But as he dove through the line on the next play, the ball was knocked out, and Charis Chillers fell on it for Jamestown. A few minutes later, Rodney Smith got wide open behind the Falcon defense, and Myles Antonini hit him with a 27-yard touchdown pass for a 10-0 lead at halftime.
"We knew we were totally in the game," said York coach Doug Pereira. "We made some adjustments and told them to go play. We shot ourselves in the foot a few times."
Chillers grabbed another York fumble early in the third quarter, but Michael Garcia took back a Jamestown drop with just over nine minutes left. Less than 60 seconds later, York was in the lead.
Charging toward the left sideline, Edwards gunned a 41-yard pass to Charlie Rogerson just before Edwards was creamed by two defenders. With Edwards on the sideline and the ball on the Eagle 10, Alex Johnston came in and fired a quick touchdown pass over the middle to Brad Myers.
The ensuing kickoff was downed at the Jamestown 16, and on first down, Rogerson hauled in an interception and outran the Eagle defense down the left sideline for a touchdown and 14-10 lead. The startled Eagles saw their next drive die at the Falcon 38, and Edwards moved York to midfield as the third quarter ended.
The next 15 minutes would be some of the craziest in recent memory.
Edwards carried for 12 yards and Denard Ashby 15 as York got to the Jamestown 19, and Edwards soon ran up the middle for a 16-yard score and 21-10 lead. When Andrew Watt yanked down an interception on first down, the Eagles appeared to be reeling.
But looks were deceiving. On first down for York, Maurice Edwards fumbled, and Rory Dillon recovered for the Eagles. On the next play, Antonini hit Evan Moog at midfield, and Moog roared down the sideline, faked out a defender, and completed a 73-yard touchdown. Antonini snuck through for the two-point conversion, and Jamestown was within 21-18.
But before the Eagles could celebrate, Edwards snatched up a fumbled kickoff at his own three, motored down the left side of the field, then charged across the middle, all the way to a 97-yard touchdown run. However, he collapsed on the sidelines afterward, and the trainers had to help him to the bench.
Meanwhile, Antonini hit a double-covered Smith for 31 yards to reach the York 25, and the Eagles eventually got a first down on the 10. But they could only go two more yards, and Zaun nailed a 25-yarder to get to 28-21 with just under four minutes to play.
As if things needed an extra dose of wildness, two of the lights at Bailey Field went off, stopping play for 10 minutes. Officials decided to try to finish the game with limited vision.
Just as Edwards broke loose on a run on the next play, a tackler leaped in from behind and knocked the ball from his hands. It skittered to the York 34, where Dillon fell on it.
On third down, Rogerson appeared to have stopped Devian Washington short of a first down, but he was called for horse-collaring Washington, giving the Eagles a first down at the York 13. Two plays later, Moog ran 10 yards to tie the score with less than two minutes left.
After Edwards returned the kickoff 20 yards to the York 33 and ran 10 yards on first down, he faded back, then rushed toward the right sideline. With three defenders within a few feet, Edwards launched a desperation heave down the center of the field. As a tackler landed hard on Edwards, the ball landed in the hands of J.R. Riddick, giving the Falcons a first down at the Eagle 15 with 1:18 to play.
Edwards made it to his feet, and limped down the field. But just as he reached the new line of scrimmage, he turned toward his team's sidelines, and fell down. Trainers looked over his injured leg, and a stretcher was brought onto the field.
Just before he was wheeled to the ambulance, Edwards gave his team one last pep talk.
"Let's do this, guys!" he shouted, pointing at his squad. "Let's finish this!"
As he left the field, the York sidelines erupted into applause, capped off by the cheerleaders' impromptu rendition of "We are proud of you, say, we are proud of you!"
In at quarterback, Johnston was sacked on first down, and managed only a yard on second. Sam Preas broke through to stop him for no gain on the next play, and, with 2.7 seconds remaining, Pereira called timeout.
Johnnie Howell came out for a game-winning field goal try, and the snap was perfect. But just as Howell blasted the kick, Antonini soared in from the right side of the Jamestown line and knocked it down, sending the game to overtime.
"That was the first kick that had anything wrong with it all year," Howell said. "I knew as soon as I hit the ball, that if it would have gone straight down the middle. I had good timing off the snap; the defense just got there."
In local high school overtimes, teams start at the opposing squad's 10, and get four chances to score. Jamestown started things off, and got things rolling quickly; after Mood ran four yards up the middle on first down, Antonini hauled around the right end for a touchdown. But Zaun's extra-point try went outside to the left, leaving Jamestown up just 34-28.
On first down, Johnston nearly hit Ashby in the endzone, but Antonini batted down the pass at the last second. On the next play, John Paul Ewan sacked Johnston for a five yard loss, and Preas and Chillers knocked him back another yard on third down.
With one play left, Pereira tried to set an example in composure-keeping.
"I know that as long as we've got another down, we've still got a dog in the fight," he said. "My feeling was that either we'd win or lose, and I'd accept either one, because it was a hard-fought battle by both teams."
His line held back the Jamestown defense, and Johnston - perhaps channeling the spirit of a Michael Jackson song that his school's band had been playing all night -- beat it toward the left sideline. A few steps inbounds, he lobbed a high pass toward Rogerson in the endzone.
With three defenders around him, Rogerson leaped for the ball. When he came down, the score was tied.
"I was thinking about catching the ball, just like in practice," he said. "Alex just threw it up, and I had to catch it."
With the game riding on his foot, Howell stepped in, and calmly sent the extra point straight through the uprights.
"It was just like every other kick," he said. "I've practiced it a million times. It was just about putting it right down the middle."
Afterward, it appeared that the win hadn't truly sunk in for a dazed-looking Johnston.
"I just knew I had to get rid of (the pass)," he said. "It was fourth down, and we needed a touchdown. It was an overwhelming finish."
