PEA RIDGE — The ’Hawks used an attacking, hustling defense to keep the heavily-favored Gentry Pioneers off the scoreboard for nearly the whole first half before mistakes led to two quick scores just before the intermission.
While not generating a whole lot of offense against the vastly more experienced Pioneers, the upstart ’Hawks held the host team at bay until a costly fumble and inopportune penalties helped Gentry to a pair of last minute touchdowns to go into the locker room up 13-0.
Before the ’Hawks could regroup from that devastating finish to the first half, the Pioneers took the opening second half kickoff and ran it back all the way to add a third touchdown that served to nearly ice the game. The ’Hawks bowed their backs at this point, keeping Gentry offense out of the end zone for the entire third quarter and most of the fourth until the Pioneers tacked on a final score in the game’s waning minutes.
“We definitely played better in the first half, right up until those mistakes that cost us a pair of touchdowns,” Blackhawk head football coach Tony Travis said. “Both touchdowns in the second half were allowed by special teams mistakes. We just have to keep improving and we just have to get more aggressive on the offensive line.”
“We are going to face a much improved Ozark team this week,” Travis continued, “and you can count on a lot of passes flying through the air.
Ozark operates a no huddle spread offense. The game will ride on our secondary and it will be a big challenge to us.”
Ozark got to within four points of Gravette (24-20) in the game’s final minutes last week before the Lions booted through a pair of field goals to keep their unbeaten streak alive.
Gravette should stay undefeated this week as they travel to Farmington. The Lions are 7 point favorites in that game. Meanwhile, it is Gentry’s turn to take a beating at the hands of Shiloh and their star-laden roster. The Pioneers are 32 point underdogs in that contest.
The most interesting game for the district and especially for Pea Ridge fans is the Berryville at Prairie Grove contest. The two teams came into the season with vastly different outlooks. The Tigers are coming off a playoff season and most observers expected that Prairie Grove would again come up with a good team. Meanwhile, league doormat Berryville was expected to keep up their series of lopsided defeats.
While Berryville has only won one game, they have been close in several and are greatly improved over the past few years.
The Tigers have only won two games and both those games could have easily been losses. The ’Hawks will be paying Prairie Grove next week with Berryville set to be our final game of the 2010 season.
The way things turned out this season, our first four conference opponents are the best four teams in the conference.
If the ’Hawks can keep improving, the youngsters might be a real threat to take some victories in the late stages of the regular season. The Pea Ridge defense, when not suffering mistakes, has proven to be the ’Hawks’ strength. At any rate, the season might get interesting for the remainder of the year.
In the state rankings, Shiloh is still the number one team and will most likely stay that way until late in the playoffs. Nashville had them beaten last year until a flurry of late game mistakes gave the game to Shiloh. There’s no telling what one of those southern Arkansas teams with speed to match Shiloh might be ableto do, given a few breaks.
Gravette is now the second ranked team in our district after moving up to the 17th spot in the state rankings. Ozark dropped to 21st in the state, third in the conference. Gentry has risen to 23rd in the state, fourth in the league, but Friday’s game with Shiloh could put a damper on things.
Farmington is ranked 28th in the state with Prairie Grove in the 33rd position, Berryville in the 40th and Pea Ridge close behind in the 41st ranking.
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Editor’s note: John McGee is the art teacher at Pea Ridge elementary schools, coaches elementary track and writes a regular sports column for The Times. He can be contacted through The Times at prtnews@ nwaonline.com.
Sports, Pages 10 on 10/13/2010