Friday night’s MHSAA Class 2A State Playoff game between East Webster and Pelahatchie was a tale of two halves.
But just when it looked like Pelahatchie was going pull off a comeback win, East Webster stormed back and scored twice in 52 seconds to take a 36-35 win over homestanding Pelahatchie on Friday night.
With the win, the Wolverines improve to 11-1 on the season and advance to the third round of the Class 2A playoffs and will travel to Northside this Friday.
It was a thrilling win for head coach Ron Price and the East Webster community that showed up en masse at Pelahatchie.
“I have been a part of a lot of high school football games and that moves to the top of that list,” Price said. “At this time of year, you have to find a way to be 1-0 every week and we did that. I can’t say enough about our kids and our coaches. They never quit. I think it shows a lot about the character of our football team. It makes me proud to be their football coach. It was a 48-minute game, that’s for sure.”
The Wolverines dominated the first half of action. East Webster grabbed the momentum early when Isaac Jones recovered a Pelahatchie fumble. The Wolverines settled for a 32-yard field goal from Parker Burleson to take a 3-0 lead with 10:32 left in the first quarter.
After a punt by Pelahatchie, The Wolverines put together their best drive of the game as they went 65 yards in 11 plays as Steven Betts hit Gray McCarter on a 21-yard touchdown pass with 4:29 left in the first. Burleson’s PAT gave the Wolverines a 10-0 lead.
The score stayed at 10-0 until late in the second quarter when the Wolverines stopped Pelahatchie on downs at their own 38. From there, the Wolverines needed just two plays to score at Betts scored on a 23-yard touchdown with 4:03 left in the half. Burleson’s PAT gave the Wolverines a 17-0 lead.
The East Webster defense forced a fumble and Betts made the Chiefs pay as he hit Jontavis Cunningham on a 74-yard pass play with 1:34 left in the half. Burleson’s PAT was good and the Wolverines led 24-0 at the half.
“It really was a tale of two halves,” Price said. “The first half couldn’t have gone any better for us. Our game plan was to stop No. 7 who was their best player and everything they did on offense revolved around him. We really contained him in the first half. And we were able to throw the football and hit a couple of scores on some blown coverages. We just told them at halftime that we didn’t need to do anything to give them momentum.”
While the first half was all East Webster, Pelahatchie mounted a huge comeback in the second half as running back Ahmad Johnson finally got going. The Louisiana-Lafayette commit scored five times on runs of 10, 88, 1, 47 and 49 yards, with the last one coming with 1:56 left in the game to give Pelahatchie a 35-24 lead.
“Once you lose the momentum, it’s hard to get it back,” Price said. “It wasn’t anything we were doing wrong, they were just making plays. We were fortunate enough to contain him for two quarters. You can see why he is going Division I.”
But that’s when Betts took to the air to lead the comeback. The Wolverines needed just 20 seconds to score as Betts hit McCarter on a 48-yard gainer and then hit the senior receiver on a 19-yard touchdown pass with 1:36 left in the game. The try for two failed and Pelahatchie led 35-30.
The Wolverines got the ball right back when McCarter recovered a perfectly executed onside kick by Burleson. The Wolverines went 50 yards in five plays as Betts hit McCarter on a 25-yard touchdown pass with 44 seconds left in game. The two-point attempt failed for the final margin of 36-35.
“When we were done by two scored, Steven promised the offensive line that they were going to win the game and that’s what they did,” Price said. “Steven’s ankle was hurting and he just gutted it out and made the plays. It was an unbelievable performance by an unbelievable group of kids.”
East Webster had 331 yards of offense with 252 in the air and 79 rushing. Betts was 12-of-27 passing for 252 yards and four TDs while he rushed for 70 yards on 18 carries. McCarter had three catches for 92 yards while Cunningham had two catches for 91 yards. Debo Patterson had six catches for 50 yards.
Ethan Roberts led the East Webster defense with 13 tackles while Isaac Jones had 10 tackles. Conner Shurden had nine tackles while Luke McKee had seven tackles and Camron Jennings added six tackles. Caleb Massey had five tackles while Carter Flora, Kendell Carden and Daniel Rogers each had four tackles apiece.
Johnson ended up with a monster night for the Chiefs, gaining 388 yards rushing on 33 carries with five TDs and three catches for 30 yards. Johnson ended the year with 2,586 yards, which is second in the state.
