After giving up two early touchdowns, the Dexter Bearcat JV football team fought back valiantly, but came up a little short in their comeback bid against the visiting Kennett Indians.
In the opening quarter, Kennett scored touchdowns on each of their first two possessions. The first was a 32 yard TD pass from Kennett's freshman quarterback Akeem Nelson to Fred Gooden. After Kennett's defense forced the Bearcats to punt on their opening possession, Hunter Haynes blasted a 47 yarder into the Indians end zone. On their second possession of the game, Kennett quickly found the end zone again from deep in their own territory. This time it was Nelson hooking up with Andre Oliver on a 77 yard touchdown pass. At the end of the first quarter, Kennett was on top by the score of 14-0.
Nelson, who only played in the first two quarters of Monday nights game looked impressive; however, this was not his first visit to Charles Bland Stadium this season, as Nelson is also a starting wide receiver and defensive back for the varsity Indians.
The Bearcats offense found themselves back on track in the second quarter, and quickly got on the scoreboard after an long and impressive drive. The scoring drive started with two spectacular runs of 26 and 21 yards by Bearcat running back Carson Dean. The drive concluded with quarterback Gavin White sneaking the ball into the end zone from the 1 yard line. The PAT kick from Aaron Sandlin was successful and the Bearcats had cut the Kennett lead to 14-7.
Just before the end of the first half, the Kennett offense was driving towards another score when Hunter Hayes came up with a huge sack, forcing a fumble that was recovered by Dexter's Storm Massey. At half, the Indians remained on top by the score of 14-7.
In the second half, the Bearcat defense played excellent. They did not allow any big plays from Kennett, they read the plays well and swarmed to the football. The defense did not allow any scores from the Kennett offense in the remainder of the contest, and twice put the Bearcat offense in a position to score and tie the game.
Early in the fourth quarter the Bearcat offense drove the ball down to the Kennett 10 yard line, but on 4th and goal Andre Oliver came up with a huge interception at the goal line and kept the Bearcats from evening up the scoreboard.
On the ensuing Kennett possession the Bearcats came up with yet another fantastic defensive stand, forcing the Indians to punt from their own end zone. The short punt left the Bearcats with excellent field position at the Kennett 20 yard line. However, this potential game tying drive also ended with a Kennett interception.
The Indians were able to run the ball effectively on the next drive, running time off the clock and forcing the Bearcats to use all of their remaining time-outs. The Bearcats ultimately forced Kennett to punt the ball away and the Bearcats has 27 seconds on the clock to move the ball 95 yards for the score. However, with the quarterback in the shotgun position the snap sailed over his head and into the end zone, resulting in a safety on the final play of the game.
The Indians came away victorious in the contest by the final score of 16-7. With the loss the JV Bearcats go to 1-3-1 on the season.
Dexter QB Gavin White completed 4 of 10 attempts for a total of 86 yards passing. Hunter Hayes caught 2 passes for 19 yards, Brandon Berry had one reception for 38 yards, and Austin Chesser hauled in a pass for 29 yards.
The Bearcats rushing attack was led by Carson Dean, who had 74 yards on only 7 carries. Gavin White ran the ball for 16 yards, Tim Spence carried the ball for 10 yards, and Jacob Murdock had two carries for a total of 6 yards.
On the defensive side of the ball, Nathan Cox led the team with 5 tackles. Austin Chesser, Brandon Berry, Hunter Hayes, Carson Dean and Brandon Wick each came up big with 4 tackles each.
The JV Bearcats fought hard on both sides of the ball and just came up a little short. The 'Cats have really made progress in every game this year and will continue so throughout the year.
