GILMER HOLDS OFF CENTER | Buckeyes’ title defense continues Thursday in S. Springs vs. Sunnyvale

By PHILLIP WILLIAMS

Exclusive to ETBLITZ.COM

TATUM – Alas for the Center Roughriders, their captivating comeback against the favored defending state potentate Gilmer Buckeyes, was flummoxed by a fluke Friday evening in a Class 4A Division II bi-district dustup at Eagle Stadium.

Center had rebounded from a 20-7 shortfall at Twirling Time to diminish its deficit to 20-14 late in the third quarter when a botched offensive play in the game’s final five minutes eventually resulted in forking over the ball to sixth-ranked Gilmer (8-3) for the rest of the contest.

Center quarterback T.J. Belin, facing to his left and evidently not expecting the ball to be snapped from his 46-yard-line, appeared to have the pigskin bounce off him and recovered by the Buckeyes at the 43 with 4:28 left in the fray.

Gilmer’s offense, which had seemingly blown a tire after toting up three first-half TDs, then adroitly managed to hog the pigskin for the remainining nine plays.

That came partly by converting a daring fourth-down pass from QB Brady McCown to Brendan Webb, notching six yards to the 20, before soon ending the spine-tingling tussle by taking a knee for a 3-yard loss to the Roughrider 12.

With the conquest of Center, which concluded the season 8-3, Gilmer prances on in Playoff Paradise with a 7 p.m. area tilt Thursday against the Sunnyvale Raiders (8-3) in Sulphur Springs.

Sunnyvale lost to two teams the Buckeyes played, Van (which Gilmer defeated) and Pleasant Grove (which beat the Buckeyes and won Gilmer’s district). The Raiders cold-cocked Caddo Mills for the second time this year, 52-27, in bi-district Thursday night.

The Buckeyes, who several years ago stupefied Sunnyvale in the playoffs when Gilmer was 4-6 and their foe was 10-0, barely snuffed that team in last year’s post-season party, 41-38. Sunnyvale, however, wasn’t ranked in the state’s top 10 entering its last wargame this season.

As for Friday’s triumph in Tatum, some observers cited the role of Gilmer penalties in keeping the Roughriders in contention to confiscate conquest from the claws of calamity.

Some of those same observers, though, opined in essence they didn’t think the officiating was particularly overly accurate for either team.

Almost lost in the obsession with the officiating was that Gilmer runner Trillyon Butler starred by legging two of his team’s trio of TDs. Center, however, leaped to an early lead before Butler and associates instigated a 20-point run.

And also perhaps largely unnoticed was the colossal contrast in the type of contest Gilmer had in the playoffs with Center last year, an offensive free-for-all which Gilmer won, 69-42.

After forcing a Gilmer punt on the game’s opening possession Friday, Center whipped 74 yards in seven plays, firing its opening scoring salvo when quarterback Belin bopped two yards to the left with 7:11 left in the initial quadrant.

Pablo Huichapa airlifted the first of his two PATs.

This galvanized Gilmer, though, as the Buckeyes took the ensuing kickoff and motored 55 yards in eight plays to reach Beulah Land on Butler’s 16-yard zip. The TD travelogue was abetted by a pass interference call against Center on a fourth-down play, all of which somehow resulted in Gilmer gaining a mere two yards to the 29.

Brayden Pate popped the first of his two successful PATs, tying things with 3:15 left in the opening act.

In the second quarter, following a Center punt, Gilmer glided 46 yards in seven plays to TD Town, the last one a case of “the Butler did it” as he hurried two yards to the right. (Actually, though, the Buckeyes had to travel somewhat more than 46 yards as they began the possession with a 10-yard penalty to their own 44 and later sustained an 11-yard penalty to their 42.

After the TD, Gilmer unsuccessfuly tried subterfuge, feigning a PAT kick and having holder Cadon Tennison pass to kicker Pate, who caught it, but was downed short of the goal line with 8:09 left to Music Time.

Then, after a while, the Buckeyes looked like they might just turn the event into the kind of fairly one-sided bludgeoning they gave the ‘Riders last year. That came after both teams’ offenses were stymied for a while and exchanged punts (one by Gilmer and two by Center, the last of which sailed out of bounds after a mediocre 21 yards to Gilmer’s 39.)

That opened the highway for the Buckeyes’ last TD, which came swiftly. On the fourth play afterward, McCown , who’d just rifled a superb 26-yard aerial to Webb, found him again behind a defender in the left side of the end zone for a 31-yard scoring sling.

After the PAT, 2:39 remained before Trombone Time and one press-box observer opined that the Roughriders’ body language showed dejection and defeatism.

If that was the case, they suddenly burst out of that emotional downtown several minutes into the second half after both offenses could produce nothing but punts. And one press box observer pointed out that much of the reversal of tide involved Gilmer penalties.

The failed Center Comeback began when a ‘Rider returned a punt a nifty 21 yards to his 43. Two runs gained a combined 12 yards before the Buckeyes drew a 15-yard pass interference infraction to their 30.

On the fourth play afterward, the Roughriders converted on fourth-down to the 18 right before Gilmer drew a 9-yard penalty to the 9. And on the next play, Center’s Timothy Johnson screamed, at startling speed, to the left to tally with 1:01 left in the third.

Suddenly, it was 20-14, but fans didn’t know the evening’s scoring had ceased. The drama, though, hadn’t.

In the fourth quarter, a Buckeye punt to the Center 14 began a Trail of Tears for the ‘Riders.

They would roll to the Buckeye 30 (greatly aided by another pass interference penalty, this one of 15 yards), only to have a measurement show they’d fallen just short of converting on fourth down with 6:04 left.

Gilmer went 3-and-out and then bonked a poor punt of only 25 yards, which sailed out of bounds at its 49. Center, presented with the opportunity to successfully complete its revival, instead drew a 5-yard penalty, threw an incompletion, and then suffered that aforementioned fateful fluke fumble.

And with that, they finished the season off-Center.