Season comes to end

At least for our area, high school football season is over.

With the early exits of Dalton and Northwest Whitfield from the Georgia High School Association’s Class 4A state playoffs on Friday — the Catamounts lost to Tucker, 35-13, while the Bruins fell 40-3 at Southwest DeKalb — and the so-close-it-hurts 16-14 loss by Christian Heritage to the North Georgia Falcons in the Glory for Christ Football League championship on Saturday, it’s “wait ‘til next year” time for local schools.

Here’s our evaluation of the final weekend on the gridiron for 2009. It’s one last Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down:

Christian Heritage

• THUMBS UP: To not giving up and rallying in the fourth quarter. Trailing by two scores with five minutes left, the Lions scored a quick touchdown and drove to the Falcons’ 2 and had a chance to kick the go-ahead field goal with 35 seconds left.

Daniel Pierce led the team with his arm and his legs, passing for 260 yards and two scores to Cody Stansell and rushed for a game-high 69 yards. Mason Sikes led the team with five catches for 102 yards.

On defense, Terrell Wilson made a big tackle on fourth down when the Falcons tried for a fake punt. On special teams, Zack Anderle changed the game’s dynamics by blocking an extra point kick after the Falcons’ first score.

• THUMBS DOWN: Mistakes cost the Lions this game. They turned the ball over twice on fumbles.

At the end of the first half, the Lions were making a final push to score and had just two timeouts remaining when a Lions receiver made a catch on the Falcons 40, but instead of running out of bounds, he tried to gain extra yards by staying in bounds. The move forced the Lions to use one of its timeouts and the drive ultimately stalled on the 44 yard line.

Miscommunication on the Lions’ go-ahead field goal attempt caused the center to snap the ball prematurely. The holder wasn’t ready for the ball, which hit him in the head, and the Lions never got the kick off.

Dalton

• THUMBS UP: Whether it was planned to be the first call of the game all along or not, the Cats’ execution on a lateral-and-pass from Stryker Brown to Tevin Collins to Shaquon Moore for a 66-yard gain on their opening play from scrimmage was brilliant. After giving up a long kickoff return and quick touchdown to Tucker to start the game, it was a must-have response that allowed them to answer almost immediately on the scoreboard.

Collins, a senior wideout, also completed a 25-yard pass to Brown, the senior quarterback, and actually finished as the game’s leading passer. He also had a great effort while attempting to make a catch in the end zone in the final minute of the first half that would have cut Tucker’s lead to a touchdown, but couldn’t hang on to the ball as he fell backward.

The Cats’ results in passing more than they have most of the season were mixed — Brown was just 6-for-20, though Chas Thomason did haul in five catches for 69 yards and no interceptions were thrown on a night neither side turned the ball over. But Brown made some nice plays with his feet, as he has all year, by doing an excellent job selling fake handoffs inside and getting in the open before the defense knew he had the ball.

Jose Garcia’s opening kickoff may have been returned 78 yards by Devin Scott, but Garcia is the only reason Scott didn’t find the end zone. The junior kicker took a good angle on Scott at the Dalton sideline and kept him from going any farther.

Finally, despite a much shorter postseason than they would have preferred, the Cats deserve credit for what they did accomplish this year, including shaking off what could have been a devastating midseason loss to Sequoyah to win a sub-region championship and extending the program’s run of winning seasons to 50.

• THUMBS DOWN: The trouble for the Cats on Friday was fairly obvious. While the offense moved the ball with success and sprung quite a few big plays — they had 10 covering 10 or more yards, including gains of 24, 25, 32, 40, 50 and 66 — they stalled in the red zone and didn’t make enough of those big plays on Tucker’s turf.

On the other side of the ball, Dalton’s defense gave up 12 gains of 10 or more yards to the run-driven Tigers, and the failure to stop them on third and fourth down was costly, too. On third down, the Tigers scored or reached the first-down marker four times out of six; when they went for it on fourth, they did that all three times.

Illegal procedure penalties were far too frequent as well for Dalton — those are the little nicks that can bleed an offense to death over the course of a game.

Northwest Whitfield

• THUMBS UP: To avoiding the shutout. Southwest DeKalb could very well win the state championship this season, and will likely punish a few other teams in the near future. An Oscar Solarzano 37-yard field goal in the third quarter at least allowed the Bruins to salvage some pride.

The scoring drive lasted 14 plays and 10 minutes, covering nearly 50 yards. The drive was sustained thanks to a successful fourth down conversion, when quarterback Chad Keeter threw a lateral to running back Jordan Darnell, who threw it back to Keeter. Keeter then ran 15 yards for the first down.

Even though it didn’t work, the Bruins should be applauded for attempting an onside kick to start the game. The aggressive play called showed the Bruins wanted to take momentum anyway they could get it.

The Bruins were penalized just once for 5 yards.

• THUMBS DOWN: To turning the ball over via a fumble and interception.

The Bruins were caught off guard on the first play from scrimmage, when the Panthers executed a hook-and-lateral that allowed them to score on a 50-yard play.

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