West Florence holds on to beat Blythewood 19-14
Big gamble on fourth and 12 helps Knights to victory
Blythewood -- The West Florence High School football team got the ball back in the waning minutes of Friday's game against Blythewood and needed to drain the clock. The Knights were up 19-14, but faced a fourth-down and-12 yards to go on their 46-yard line with about three minutes to go.
The Bengals made their share of offensive mistakes in a sloppy game, but they also scored two touchdowns in quick fashion. Even so, West Florence punting the ball away at midfield seemed the safe thing to do.
WFHS Punter Keyshawn Johnson also happens to be a quarterback. With the team in punt formation, Johnson took the snap, but rather than kick the ball away as he did five times before, he fired a pass to Jayaun Perkins, who extended the pass into a 16-yard first down effort.
With the pickup, West Florence kept the ball and drove down to the Blythewood 10 before the Bengals finally forced a turnover on downs—with 12 seconds left.
Blythewood quarterback John Henry Collins completed two passes, one to go-to receivers Chance Johnson and Carter Coleman. The two completions got the Bengals to midfield, but by then time had run out on them, and the Knights walked off the field with a 19-14 victory at the BHS field.
“We roll the dice a whole lot around here, that’s kind of what we hung our hat on,” West
Florence head coach Jody Jenerette said. “Great call by Coach (Aundres) Perkins, it was his idea and the kids responded well. We never practiced it. That’s pretty cool when you don’t
practice something and it goes like that.”
That was the way it went in a game where a charged Blythewood defense made a great effort in covering for a frustrated offense that battled pass drops, an interception, three fumbles and a 2-yard punt.
The Bengals had minus-10 rushing yards at game’s end. Collins finished the night 18-for-28 for 234 yards and two touchdowns, but that interception led to a score that gave the Knights, who improved to 5-2 on the season and 2-1 in Region 5-AAAAA, a 13-0 lead at first quarter’s end.
The West Florence defensive line hurried the senior quarterback several times, with one sack in the third quarter that was catastrophic for the Bengals.
With Blythewood, which fell to 8-2 and 2-2, up 14-13 and at its 31-yard line to start a possession, Collins took the snap and felt pressure from West Florence’s interior linemen. Knights defenders chased him nearly to the goal line until Collins fell and lost the ball. Victor Tabb scooped up the ball at the 1 and walked it in for the go-ahead score at the 2:08 mark of the third quarter.
After that sack, the Bengals didn’t get a first down until four possessions later—with eight seconds on the clock.
While the Blythewood defense made several stands, including two turnovers on downs and two interceptions by Jaylen Reaves, the Bengals gave up yardage and two early scores — touchdown passes from Avery Weaver to Terry Lowery and to Romelo Patterson in the first quarter.
“We lost in all three phases tonight,” Blythewood head coach James Martin said. “You can’t do that and expect to win a football game. And the sad part is we had our chances. We didn’t take advantage of it. I’ll take the blame in that I thought we were ready. We weren’t ready.”
Blythewood seemed ill-prepared from the start.
West Florence forced a punt on Blythewood’s opening possession, then the Knights offense worked the ball downfield on 14 plays. Weaver closed out an 65-yard drive with a 33-yard touchdown pass to Lowery on fourth and 12.
The Knights ran the same play in the closing seconds of the first quarter, with Weaver connecting with Patterson for a 32-yard touchdown pass to make it 13-0.
The only shining moment for Blythewood in the first half was Collins’ 42-yard TD strike to
Coleman that cut the Knights’ lead to 13-7 at the 9:19 mark of the second. Collins’ second touchdown pass, a 35-yarder to Ben Hendrix to open the third quarter, gave the
Bengals a 14-13 lead.
Blythewood’s quick-strike capability showed then, but the mistakes returned soon after,
including Tabb’s scoop-and-score with 2:08 left in the third quarter.
"Our guys make plays, I wish we could’ve made a few more, but every now and then you’ve got to play a game like this,” Jenerette said. “That’s the bottom line, you’ve got to come to somebody’s place and win a game like that and that’s what we did tonight.”
West Florence is at Ridge View (4-3, 3-0), and Blythewood travels to unbeaten Sumter (7-0, 3-0) next Friday.
West Florence 13 0 6 0 – 19
Blythewood 0 7 7 0 – 14
First Quarter
W - Terry Lowery 33 pass from Avery Weaver (Sarah Cashin kick) 6:00
W - Romelo Patterson 32 pass from Weaver (Cashin kick) :21
Second Quarter
B - Carter Coleman 42 pass from John Henry Collins (Liam Flynn kick) 9:19
Third Quarter
B – Ben Hendrix 35 pass from Collins (Flynn kick) 10:42
W – Victor Tradd 1 fumble return (pass failed) 2:08
WF BHS
First Downs 17 11
Rushes-yds 46-104 15-(-10)
Passing yds 158 234
Att-Com-Int 28-10-2 29-18-1
Fumbles-lost 0-0 3-1
Penalties-yds 7-50 9-80
Punts-avg 5-38.0 7-30.3
RUSHING
W – Avery Weaver 9-40, Terry Lowery 18-33, Keyshawn Johnson 12-51, Zion Hill 4-3, Jayaun
Perkins 2-10, Team 1-20. B – Ryan Hall 5-0, Alonzo Kyles 3-8, John Henry Collins 5-(-28),
Carter Coleman 1-9, Chance Johnson 1-1.
PASSING
W – Avery Weaver 5-13-0, Keyshawn Johnson 5-15-2. B – John Henry Collins 18-29-1.
RECEIVING
W – Jayaun Perkins 5-63, Terry Lowery 3-53, Romelo Patterson 1-32, Gage Herring 1-11. B –
Carter Coleman 5-76, Kanye Reed 7-74, Ben Hendrix 3-44, Chance Johnson 3-40.
