WINFIELD — None of the Winfield players could recall a victory over Putnam County rival, for good reason.
The Generals started a new streak of their own on Friday however, posting a 17-16 home win over the Redskins.
“It had been about 18 years,” said Winfield coach Willie Wilson. “It feels great. It’s good to get that monkey off of our backs. It’s been hard.”
Hurricane scored a touchdown with 2:38 showing on the fourth quarter clock to trim the Winfield lead to one point. But Winfield’s Josh Clark batted down the potential game-tying extra point attempt to seal the victory.
“Right before he kicked it, I told myself ‘you better jump up there and block it,’ ” said Clark.”It was a low kick but I got a hand on it.”
“It was a very big play,” Wilson said. “We probably should have scored another touchdown, and that might have broken their spirit. But stuff like that happens. We just overcame. I can’t help but think that we got some divine intervention in a couple of situations.”
On their first offensive possession, the Generals marched 55 yards in four plays – thanks in large part to a first down flea-flicker that saw running back Clark fling a strike to wideout Tyler Kincaid for a 52-yard gain.
The play set up a 33-yard field goal by senior kicker Matt Wilton that gave Winfield a 3-0 advantage with 8:20 left in the opening quarter.
The Generals got a break when senior defensive tackle Daniel Thomas pounced on a Redskins fumble deep in Hurricane territory with three minutes remaining in the first half.
Winfield took over at the Hurricane 19 and pounded the ball forward on five consecutive carries, culminated by a 6-yard touchdown by junior Toby Brown who lowered his shoulder and spun into the end zone with at least three Redskins draped on his back.
Hurricane used two quarterbacks in the first half – Luke Briggs and Tyler Pate, but each went just 1-for-5 on their pass attempts. But Redskins receivers were partly to blame, dropping several would-be first down arrows that fell harmlessly to the ground.
Hurricane turned its fortunes around in the third quarter, scoring 10 points on a 22-yard TD pass from Luke Briggs to Cameron Cooper and booting a 24-yard field goal off the foot of Aaron Browne to tie it at 10-10.
The Generals answered quickly however. Kincaid picked off a pass and ran it back 12 yards for a score to give Winfield a 17-10 lead following the point after kick by Wilton.
Three plays later, Nathan Lewis recovered a Hurricane fumble near midfield to stall a Redskins drive.
But Hurricane mounted a defensive stand of its own coupled with a 13-play drive that took the Redskins 90 yards and ate over eight minutes of the game clock before scoring the potential game-tying TD.
That’s when Clark came to the rescue.
“It is disappointing” admitted Hurricane coach Willlis May. “But I knew it all along because of the week of practice we had. We didn’t deserve to win this ballgame. I thought we were going to throw up a big goose egg. Hopefully this is a wake-up call to our football team. We’re going to have to pay our dues all week and not expect to walk out there on Friday night and win. You can’t do that in Class AAA.”
Hurricane outgained Winfield 248 yards to 169.
Clark led all rushers with 55 yards on 19 carries. Kincaid had two catches for 65 yards.
Winfield will play host to Ripley on Friday, while Hurricane hosts Nitro for its home opener.
Hurricane 0 0 10 6 — 16
Winfield 3 7 7 0 — 17
W- Matt Wilton 33 FG
W – Toby Brown 6 run (Wilton kick)
H – Cameron Cooper 22 pass from Luke Briggs (Aaron Browne kick)
H – Browne 22 FG
W – Tyler Kincaid 12 interception return (Wilton kick)
H – Luke Briggs 6 run (kick blocked)
