The Bearden-West rivalry game didn’t just punctuate Week 1 on Saturday night.
It slapped an exclamation mark or two on the end of it.
Bearden avenged its heart-wrenching loss to West from the 2023 season opener with a triple-overtime, 31-24 thriller that will be remembered for years to come.
THE BACKGROUND
Last year, West got a 45-yard touchdown pass over the top to Syxx Hoard with 17.4 seconds left to lift the Rebels to a 14-10 win over the Bulldogs.
Entering the 2024 season, Bearden hadn’t beaten West since 2018.
HOW THEY SCORED
Bearden (1-0) tacked on the game’s first touchdown just 15 seconds in, as Ethan Couvertiere returned a West fumble for a touchdown.
Bearden ultimately led 10-0 after the first quarter. William Pendergrass booted through a 37-yard field goal at the 2:15 mark of the first, capitalizing on yet another West turnover.
The Bulldogs got a 36-yarder from Pendergrass — a punter by reputation — in the early minutes of the second quarter to stake a 13-0 advantage.
Two-time defending 5A champion West (0-1) led 14-13 at the half, though, getting a short-yardage run by Anterius McAlister with 5:36 before the break and then another McAlister scoring run inside the 10 with 2:13 left in the half.
After a scoreless third, Bearden junior tailback Jayzon Thompson scored from the 2 with 9:43 left in the fourth. Bearden sophomore QB D.J. Hunter hit Drew Parrott for a two-point conversion pass and 21-14 lead.
Tavion Ray, of West, scored on a 7-yard run with 3:28 to play. The Rebels converted key third- and fourth-down plays to keep the drive going.
The two teams traded field goals in the first overtime.
In the second overtime, West fumbled on its opening possession. But Bearden didn’t take advantage; rather, it botched its game-winning, field-goal attempt.
Bearden running back Torian Riggins got a short-yardage score to open the third overtime and gave the Bulldogs a 31-24 lead.
West didn’t answer. On fourth-and-17, West heaved a prayer into double coverage that went incomplete but was close to being caught.
“I’m really proud of our kids,” West coach Lamar Brown said. “The game started about as bad as it could start. … We were lucky to only be down 13-0 (early in the second quarter). But they responded and kept fighting.
“This is a special group. This group isn’t going to do anything but get better and get back to work and get ready for Clinton and see where we’re at next week.”
THE CRITICAL POINTS
West linebacker Jack Keith made two big interceptions: one early, one late.
The first came in the first quarter inside the red zone, preventing Bearden from possibly jumping to a 14-0 lead.
The second came during crunch time.
With the score knotted at 21-all with less than a minute to play, Bearden faced a third-and-6 from the West 17. After a Bearden timeout, the Bulldogs didn’t do what everyone assumed they would — which was to call a conservative run play and set up the game-winning field-goal attempt.
Nope.
They rolled out QB D.J. Hunter to the right and he darted a ball into the middle of the field, where Keith snagged it.
“That’s 100 percent on me. You don’t put a 15-year-old kid (at quarterback) in that spot,” Bearden coach Josh Jones said. “That’s 100 percent on me. I told the staff on the headsets that I have to do a better job of putting him in better situations. I got to coach better. That’s 100 percent on me.
“We’d run the ball so much,” Jones added about his decision. “We thought we had sucked (West) in (on defense). We ran a flat-route RPO in the flat. We’d told (Hunter), if he’s wide open, throw it. Anything else, throw it at his feet. Again, I shouldn’t have put him in that spot. We should have run the football and kick the field goal on fourth down if we didn’t get it.”
West actually had a chance to win in the final seconds. After two Bearden penalties ushered the Rebels to the Bearden 33, West’s final heave in regulation was intercepted at the goal line.
Bearden aided West a couple of other times in the contest, as well.
Take, for example, the dropped sure-fire bomb of a touchdown pass delivered by Hunter with 3:12 left in the first half that would have given Bearden a double-digit lead. Instead, the receiver dropped it. Next play: bad snap on a punt, giving West the ball deep into Bearden territory. The Rebels scored on that possession and took the lead, 14-13.
Bearden muffed a punt at midfield with 8:27 remaining in the fourth quarter while leading 21-14. West recovered and went on to score on that possession.
And in double overtime, after Ethan Hill forced a fumble/turnover on West’s opening possession, Bearden couldn’t punch in a score with its run game. The Bulldogs were left with a kick to win it.
That 17-yard field goal would have won it. But the snap and setup for the kick didn’t go as planned, rendering holder Drew Parrott — the starting quarterback in previous seasons — dropping back into scramble mode and throwing incomplete into the end zone.
Despite it all, Bearden kept its cool, trusting its run game in the final stanza and then watching its defense seal the deal.
GOING FORWARD
Bearden will play host to Alcoa (0-1) in Week 2. Bearden had Alcoa on the ropes in a Week 2 contest in 2023 before a late turnover at the goal line gave Alcoa new life and a second chance. Alcoa drove the length of the field and scored to take that game, 17-13. Now, Alcoa is coming in motivated, trying to avoid its first 0-2 start since 2002.
West, meanwhile, will play host to Clinton (0-1) in Week 2.
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