Bluefield wins 10th state championship
Saturday, December 5 , 2009
By RICK THORP- The Intelligencer & Wheeling News-Register
If anyone would have told Bluefield coach Fred Simon prior to Friday night's West Virginia Class AA championship game that his team would only run 10 plays for 13 yards in the second half against undefeated Wayne and still win the title, he might have said they were crazy.
But that's exactly what transpired at Wheeling Island Stadium as the Beavers captured the 10th crown in school history, and fifth in Class AA since 1997, with a memorable 27-7 triumph against the top-seeded Pioneers.
''What makes this game so great is that, no matter how many years you've been in it, things happen the way you can never imagine,'' Simon said. ''And things happened that way (Friday night).''
The Pioneers topped the Beavers in almost every statistic, including turnovers, and those proved to be Wayne's downfall as Bluefield scored off all but one.
''It was a game of turnovers,'' Wayne coach Tom Harmon said. ''We had the ball pop out at some inopportune times in the game and that stuff happens.''
But rarely to the state's top-rated squad. All season Wayne had been running the ball down opposing team's throats. It was no different in the second half Friday night.
The Pioneers came out of locker room at halftime on a mission and trailing 14-7.
After picking up three first downs in the first half, Wayne got three on an opening drive that saw it drive inside into the Bluefield 20.
But faced with a fourth-and-11 at the 15, Wayne did something it had only done four times in the game - throw. And like the other four times this one wasn't completed. It was worse.
Wayne quarterback Adam Frazier thought he had Austin Mills open near the goal line. But as he threw a pass off of his back foot, Bluefield's Marcus Patterson stepped in front of the throw, picked it off and raced 97 yards down the Beavers' sideline for the score.
The extra point failed, but Bluefield went up 20-7 as the game's momentum did a U-turn.
''Whenever we need a big play, it's my job to step up and that's what I did,'' Patterson said describing the return, the longest in Class AA title game history.
With 7:47 left in the third quarter, the Pioneers were hardly out of the game.
Wayne continued to run the ball well, led by a stable of runners that included Corey Damron, Clyde Ferrell and Jake Barr.
All three carried the ball on Wayne's ensuing possession that saw it again get inside the Bluefield 20, but come up empty when a fourth-down play went for zero yards.
Following a Bluefield punt, Wayne set up shop at its own 43. Runs of 8 and 6 yards by Damron, along with a 5-yard jaunt by Ferrell, helped get the Pioneers to the Beavers' 25.
But faced with another fourth-and-long situation, Frazier was called on to pass again with familiar results.
Patterson, awarded the Samuel Mumley Award by members of the media as his team's top player, picked off another pass at the 3. While this one wasn't returned, it hammered another nail into Wayne's coffin.
The Pioneers (13-1) held the Beavers at bay defensively, and with less than 4 minutes remaining, Wayne's offensive had another shot.
Again the Pioneers drove deep into Bluefield territory and again they couldn't avert disaster.
On fourth-and-goal from the Bluefield 5, Frazier threw the game's first completed first pass to Mills, who was immediately hit at the line of scrimmage by Bluefield's Brad Fox.
Fox ripped the ball from Mills' hands and raced down the Beavers' sideline untouched 95 yards for the score. The last of Justin Mariotti's three extra-point kicks made the score 27-7 and sealed the victory.
''Our offense just could never get good field position during the second half,'' Simon said. ''But our defense really stepped up and I'm proud of them.''
Jake Lilly was the offensive star for Bluefield, rushing for 51 yards and two touchdowns - all in the first half.
Damron, named Wayne's Samuel Mumley Award winner, had a 3-yard touchdown run in the first quarter for the Pioneers' only points.
Bluefield (12-2) had a tough road to the title, defeating the top three seeds - Sherman, Magnolia and Wayne - en route to the crown.
It's the greatest feeling in the world when you do this having beaten three undefeated teams like we've had to the last three weeks,'' Simon said.
''The players were really challenged and it's just an unbelievable feeling I have for these young men.''
