Cardiac Cyclones

The state of the two locker rooms at Culpeper County High School’s Broman Field told the tale.

On one end, Eastern View’s locker room thumped with excitement. Coaches patted each other on the back and players high-fived on the way out.

In the CCHS locker room, if a pin dropped, it would have been sounded like a cannon shot. Players wiped tears from their eyes and head coach Mike Williams sat on a bench, head hung low.

Williams and the Blue Devils had nothing to hang their heads about, however, as they had just lost a battle of attrition 20-19 to the cross-town Cyclones.

“It was a physical game, and everyone said we couldn’t play physical,” EVHS head coach Greg Hatfield said. “We played a nice physical game. I’m very proud of our effort.”

However, it wasn’t physicality that won the game for Eastern View, it was their patented finesse.

Culpeper was holding onto a precarious 19-14 lead in the fourth quarter when the Blue Devil defense looked like it was going to seal the deal against the Cyclones.

Eastern View had pushed its way into Culpeper territory, but faced a fourth-and-eight with 4:58 to play. Culpeper had harassed sophomore quarterback Simon Pendleton all game, but the EVHS line gave its signal-caller enough time to make magic happen.

“We didn’t get pressure, without pressure you can’t keep everyone covered all the time,” CCHS head coach Mike Williams said.

Pendleton found Carl Lacy down the seam for a 31-yard touchdown reception, restoring the Cyclones’ lead with 4:51 to play.

“I told Simon to just put it on me and I’ll get to it,” Lacy said. “Once I did the route, the dude turned around, I knew I had it. All he had to do was make the perfect throw and I had it.”

The Blue Devils had one final shot to regain the lead, and it nearly came to pass.

CCHS started on its own 31-yard line, but quarterback Donald Downs quickly moved the Blue Devils into striking distance with a 28-yard run into EVHS territory.

The Blue Devils worked the ball down to Eastern View’s 19-yard line, and faced a fourth-and-one before Downs was stopped just inches short to give the ball back to the Cyclones.

“They did play great, they played very well. I have nothing negative to say about the kids,” Williams said. “They played great, we ended up a point short.”

Eastern View’s defense was the reason for the point difference.

On the second drive of the second half, Culpeper looked as though it was poised to score as they set up shop on the nine-yard line after a 29-yard pass from Downs to Duane Wilkins.

The Blue Devils drove down to the one, where they faced a fourth-and-one. But while CCHS’s running game dominated for the majority of the game, this time EVHS’s defense won out as Cortez Rollins was stonewalled at the 1.

“Our defense felt challenged, there was a lot of stuff in the paper about how our defense couldn’t play physical and about how they couldn’t stop the run,” Hatfield said. “I thought we did a great job of making stops when we had to make stops. That goal line stop was huge.”

Early on, it seemed as though Eastern View wouldn’t have to face those challenges late in the game. The Cyclones jumped out to an early first quarter lead on a 28-yard run by V.J. Ivory.

After a Downs’ interception set up the Cyclones at the Blue Devil 13-yard line, Pendleton hooked up with Ivory for a 13-yard score and a 14-0 lead going into the second quarter.

Then Culpeper came alive.

The Blue Devils put together a long scoring possession, a nine-play, 61-yard drive that ended when Downs hooked up with John Lezcano for a 34-yard touchdown.

Two series later Culpeper put together a 10-play drive that was capped off by a one-yard plunge by Cortez Rollins.

However, the two-point conversion failed and Culpeper trailed 14-12 going into the second half.

In the third quarter, the Blue Devils dominated. They took control with their power running game and Eastern View only had the ball for 2:54.

“We have a pretty darn good offensive line, and I told them a couple of weeks ago we were going to put these games on their shoulders,” Williams said. “They’ve carried us as far as we’ve gone this year.”

The line carried the Blue Devils to the lead with 24 seconds remaining in the third quarter.

Facing fourth-and-goal from the five-yard line, Larry Williams weaved his way through traffic for a touchdown, giving the Blue Devils the 19-14 advantage.

“Our goal at the beginning of the year was to make people fear coming here,” Williams said. “We wanted to punish anyone who came into this field. If we couldn’t end up on the top of the scoreboard, we were going to punish them. We weren’t going to play dirty, we weren’t going to be cheap, but we’re going to hit you.”

And the Blue Devils gave the Cyclones hit-after-hit, but like a sponge, EVHS kept bouncing back.

“Everything this team has been through this year, we’ve gotten better,” Hatfield said. “They did a good job of staying in the game and taking control there. We did a great job of not hanging our heads and our defense got their composure back. That was a heck of a win.”