BY DANIEL SCHMIDT
THE OBSERVER
BEULAH — A string of several close losses in Class 3A Region 2 play left Beulah High School needing a win against Slocumb High School to remain in prime position to make the playoffs.
However, the Bobcats (3-4, 2-4) fell 20-15 to the Red Tops (3-3, 3-2) at Bobcat Stadium on Oct. 12 in a rare Monday afternoon game due to Hurricane Isaias.
Slocumb scored the winning touchdown on a 24-yard pass with 51 seconds left to cap off what had been a sloppy, fiercely contested game.
Beulah led 15-14 when the Red Tops took over at their own 7-yard line with 4:30 remaining. Weston Sasser opened the drive with a 23-yard run and added a 15-yarder. A 14-yard run by Hayes Hatton moved Slocumb into Beulah territory.
Bobcats defender Brayden Bunn then sacked Sam Bryant for a 13-yard loss, his second sack of the night. Slocumb recovered, and Bryant found a receiver for the go-ahead score three plays later, capping a 93-yard drive. The two-point try failed.
Beulah got one last chance from midfield. Tristen Robinson caught passes of 9 and 12 yards, and the Bobcats reached the Slocumb 15. Two incompletions ended the game.
“It’s disheartening,” Beulah head coach Michael Courson said. “Feel bad for our guys, but these region games are big. This game was big.”
Sasser led Slocumb with 111 rushing yards on 16 carries. Hayes Hatton added 52 yards on 14 carries. The Red Tops ran for 255 yards before sacks, while Beulah managed 124 on 35 carries.
“We can’t just sit back and let people run it at us,” Courson said. “We’ve got to go at them and take the fight to them.”
The game started with a turnover. On Beulah’s first play from scrimmage, a hook-and-lateral went wrong, and Slocumb’s Josh Odom recovered at the Bobcats’ 22. Slocumb drove inside the red zone, but two false starts stalled the drive and the Red Tops turned it over on downs.
Beulah answered with a 12-play, 92-yard drive. Its key play was a 36-yard catch by Robinson, who finished it with an 8-yard touchdown run with 34 seconds left in the first quarter. Josue Valle’s extra point made it 7-0.
Slocumb’s defense scored the first points for the Red Tops. After a Slocumb punt pinned Beulah at its own 8, Luke Darnell sacked Kason Kalla on second down. John Cole Hatton then blocked the Bobcats’ punt and scored, and Sasser ran in the two-point conversion to give Slocumb an 8-7 lead with 7:39 left in the half.
Slocumb drove from its own 28 to the Beulah 20 late in the second quarter, helped by a 21-yard run from Aiden Graves. The drive ended on downs with 31 seconds left, and the Red Tops led 8-7 at halftime.
Beulah took the lead back on the first possession of the second half. A chop-block penalty and a fumble the Bobcats recovered pushed them back early. Then two Slocumb unsportsmanlike conduct penalties gave them 30 free yards. Kalla scored on a 2-yard run, and Carter Grant ran in the two-point conversion for a 15-8 lead with 7:05 left in the third quarter.
Slocumb responded with a long drive to the Beulah 16, but Bunn sacked Bryant for a 17-yard loss on fourth down.
The Red Tops scored on their next possession. On the seventh play of a 70-yard drive, Eli Hinson broke a 39-yard touchdown run with 8:48 to play. The two-point attempt failed, leaving Slocumb behind 15-14 until the final drive.
Robinson led Beulah with seven catches for 105 yards. Kalla completed 12 of 24 passes for 152 yards and ran for a touchdown. Courson credited both players for their big plays but said he didn’t want to single anyone out.
“This needs to be a team win and a team loss,” he said.
The storm pushed the game from Friday to Monday, and Courson said while the change disrupted his team’s routine, he wouldn’t use it as an excuse.
“I’m not going to sit here and make excuses for it being a Monday or a 4 o’clock game or whatever,” he said. “We got to come out here and play football and execute, and they did that better than us tonight.”
Beulah has little time to regroup as it hosts Wicksburh High School (3-5, 1-3) on Friday, Oct. 16, at 7 p.m. The Panthers are coming off a 48-22 loss to Booker T. Washington High School on Oct. 9.
“Now we’ve got to go fix some stuff and see if we can get ready for Wicksburg in a couple of days,” Courson said.
