SPORTS
Bowie falls short at Henrietta
The Bowie Jackrabbits ran out of time for a second week in a row playing at Henrietta on Friday night.
The Bearcats held off a fourth quarter rally from the Jackrabbits to win 29-26.
Henrietta came in as favorite after winning its first two games while Bowie was still looking for its first victory. While the Jackrabbits were coming in with some confidence after coming back from 30 points down against Bridgeport the previous week and falling only one point short.
Bowie’s offense was going to take a hit as quarterback Brody Armstrong would have to sit out the first half of the game after being disqualified at the end of the previous game. Back-up sophomore Zac Harris would lead the Bowie offense and hope to put the team in a good position to win.
The Jackrabbit offense got into Bearcat territory on their first drive after a good kickoff return. Unfortunately, the offense fumbled the ball to Henrietta who returned it into Bowie territory. Later the Bearcats scored on a 16-yard touchdown pass to go up 7-0.
Henrietta scored on its next drive featuring a heavy dose of the run game, steadily driving down the field until punching it in from the one-yard-line to make it 14-0.
The Jackrabbit defense got their first stop of the game before the first quarter was done. Case Curry jumped up to intercept a pass a midfield.
The Bowie offense would take advantage. After converting a fourth and long during the drive, Harris would connect downfield with receiver A.J. Whatley for a 17-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 14-6 to begin the second quarter.
Both defenses were able to stifle any more scoring from the other team’s offense for the rest of the half, including forcing turnover on downs deep in their own territories. While the Jackrabbit defense did tighten things up, the Bearcats shot themselves in the foot every drive with penalties that set them back that helped Bowie.
The Jackrabbits were down only one score heading into halftime and would be getting their starting quarterback back who hopefully could jumpstart the offense.
Henrietta cleaned up the penalties and took the opening drive right down the field before scoring on a short run to up the lead to 21-6.
Bowie’s offense did not immediately change with Armstrong in the game as it turned the ball over on downs on its own 35 after only four plays. The Bearcats took advantage of the shortened field and scored on another short run to make it 29-6 midway through the third quarter.
The Jackrabbits were not going to give up though as they had been down worse just the previous week. On Bowie’s next drive, Armstrong used his legs to extend the play before firing deep and connecting with Whatley on a 46-yard touchdown that energized the Jackrabbit side, cutting the lead to 29-12.
At the beginning of the fourth quarter after the Bowie defense was able to get a stop the Jackrabbit offense drove into the Henrietta territory, but unfortunately turned the ball over on an interception while facing a fourth and long.
Thankfully Bowie’s defense was able to get another stop and the Jackrabbits quickly moved down field and scored when Armstrong took off down the right side for a 24-yard touchdown run to cut the lead to 29-18 with 5:47 to play.
Bowie went for an onside kick that was pooched into air instead of on the ground and it was recovered by the Jackrabbits Trevor Hopson.
Things were not looking good as two negative plays pushed the Jackrabbits back into their own territory despite starting at midfield, facing a third and forever.
Bowie somehow converted thanks to a 41-yard pass to Hunter Taylor and later would score when Armstrong found running back Matthew McCarty open out in the flats and he ran around the right side for a 27-yard catch and run touchdown.
The Jackrabbits then scored their only two-point conversion of the game to cut the lead to 29-26 with 4:22 left to play.
The previous scoring sequence somehow only took 1:25 and everything had been going Bowie’s way during the quarter. The team still had two timeouts and the defense had been getting stops since midway through the third quarter. Even if the team could not recover another onside kick, surely the defense could get the ball back.
Unfortunately, the Jackrabbit offense never saw the field again. Henrietta recovered the onside kick and slowly but surely ran out the remaining time, never facing a scary fourth down conversion that would have stopped things.
Bowie ran out of time again, losing 29-26.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
Two former Bowie boy’s golf members played in the PGA University Championship on Nov. 12-13. (L-R) Cy Egenbacher and Imanol Walker are both in the Sam Houston University PGA Golf Managerment program. The team finished 16th overall. Egenbacher shot 168 during the two rounds and finished tied for 67th. Walker shot 180 and finished 84th. The tournament is a fun one for univesities that have PGA Golf Management programs, which is for individuals who want to work in the golf industry after graduation.
The Saint Jo Lady Panthers came up short at the regional final for the third straight season, one game away from state, on Saturday at the regional tournament in Midlothian.
The Lady Panthers beat Evant in straight sets 3-0 on Friday to reach the final game against Harrold which they lost 3-0.
Saint Jo knew before the season even started it would likely come to this big challenge, but it still had to go through all the steps to get there.
The Panthers reached the regional finals the previous two seasons, losing both times to eventual state champion Blum.
With district realignment meant a new region so a rematch with a Blum program that had graduated several key players from those teams would have to wait until state possibly.
Instead, a showdown against last year’s state runner-up Harrold was forecast in the regional final.
With the team having six seniors, with five of them having been on varsity since they were freshman, it was this year or bust for Saint Jo.
First, the Lady Panthers had to beat Evant. The Lady Elks leaned heavily on a big front court player. When she rotated to the back row, Evant showed almost no net resistance which meant Saint Jo hitters had free reign during that time.
The Lady Panthers won each set pretty easily, with the scores being 25-17, 25-17 and 25-19.
This set up the match with Harrold the team had been anticipating. The Lady Hornets had been at or near the top of the state standings since the beginning of the season.
Harrold had so much respect it had even played bigger local schools this season, beating Bowie in straight sets and Nocona in five sets during its pre-district schedule.
The two teams had met earlier in the season when the Lady Hornets attended Saint Jo’s hosted tournament. The two teams met in the tournament championship where Harrold won 2-1.
Still, with the tournament format being a best of three instead of five and the match after playing an exhausting schedule of five matches the previous two days, that result was not gospel, especially two months later.
The challenge is Harrold had multiple big hitters at the net, which is a big deal since most 1A teams are lucky to have one or two, which meant constant pressure on Saint Jo’s defense.
This also meant the Lady Panthers constantly had to find ways to attack the Lady Hornet defense as well or it would face strong hit after strong hit which was unsustainable for any team.
The first set saw the Lady Hornets get out to a good start before the Lady Panthers rallied back and took a little lead 8-7. Unfortunately, it started turn from there.
Harrold had some good runs from the service line that Saint Jo struggled to make much offense out of and led to the Lady Hornets pulling away. Harrold won 4-1 to get the lead to 11-9 and then extended it to 14-11, 17-13. Another 4-1 run and the Lady Hornets could smell the end of the first set coming.
The Lady Hornets won 25-17 to take the lead 1-0.
Saint Jo needed to bounce back, but unfortunately never got anything going in set two.
Harrold led 4-1 and then 8-2. The Lady Panthers would have needed a huge run at some point from the service line to get back into the set, but it never came as the Lady Hornets lead grew more and more.
Harrold took set two 25-13 to go up 2-0 and had all of the momentum.
Saint Jo had its back against the wall, knowing the only option was to hope for a comeback that would lead to a fifth set, but to get there it needed to win set three.
The Lady Panthers initially started on the right foot. After falling being 4-1 to start the previous two sets, it was Saint Jo that started well up 4-1. Unfortunately, the Lady Hornets came roaring back, going on an 8-2 run as it led 9-6, then 12-8 and 15-10.
It looked like it was heading towards a similar place as set one with Harrold slowly running away with the set before the Lady Panthers made one last gasp.
Saint Jo eventually cut the lead down to one point, trailing 20-19 as the set entered the final stretch and the Lady Panthers had their best momentum of the match.
Unfortunately, it was Harrold that was able to close the set out with momentum, earning the final five points to win 25-19 and the match 3-0.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News. For pictures from Friday’s match, click here https://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?l=bnews1&AID=6870620&T=1
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