By Lonnie Turner

Okay! So the Dillon Wildcats lost to the Mallard Creek, NC, Mavericks on Friday night. Wasn’t that the way it was supposed to be? I mean, you have a 2A school with less than 900 students going up against a Big 16 4A school with 2,000 students. It was predicted by most sportswriters throughout the two Carolinas…and quite a few football “experts,” that the Mavericks would blow Dillon right out of the stadium and it would be over by the third quarter, but other than the Wildcat faithful, who would have thought the Cats would have made it so tough for the Big 16 nationally ranked power from the old North State?

For forty-three minutes, the Cats held their ground with the talented Mavericks, before finally giving way in the final five minutes or so left in the game. Following a late touchdown by the Cats to tie the game for a third time, this time at 21-21, Mallard Creek head coach Mike Palmieri went to his running game on the final scoring drive of the game that pretty well took the punch out of the Dillon defense. Quarterback Emiere Scaife completed two first down passes on the way to the winning touchdown, but it was the hard running by tailback Lawrence Pittman that sealed the win. Pittman, who finished the night with 136 yards on 15 carries, accounted for 59 yards on the way to the final score of the night.

“It was our strategy from the start to wear them down, because we knew they had kids that had to go both ways,” he said. “We love playing teams with a program like Dillon that can pack so many people in the stands.”

It was the largest crowd at Memorial Stadium since Hartsville and Dillon clashed in the last game of the regular season with 10-0 records in 1993, which was Dillon coach Jackie Hayes’ second season at the helm of the Wildcats.

Coach Palmieri’s strategy was a good one, but because the Wildcats matched his team’s effort by scoring every time they did, it took almost the entire game to wear the Wildcat defense down.

“At the break, we decided to just run the ball during the second half and not throw. We just ran right at them and finally wore them down on that last scoring drive,” Coach Palmieri continued.

“I couldn’t be any prouder of the way our kids played,” explained Dillon coach Jackie Hayes. “They gave all they had and that’s all we can ask of them. Every body was talking about how they were going to blow us out, but we played right there to the very end.”

It didn’t take the Mavericks long to get on the scoreboard in the see-saw battle, taking the opening kick off and marching 82 yards running and throwing the football. After the ’Cats went three and out on offense, the defense, led by Joe Blue, took over and held the Mavericks on their last two possessions in the first quarter to just eight plays.

Dillon opened the second 12 minute segment at their own 42-yard line and in seven plays tied the visitors on an 8-yard throw from sophomore quarterback Avery McCall to Anthony Blue. Tara Grimsley hit her first of three extra points to deadlock the game at 7-7.

Wildcat safety Malique Gregory forced a fumble on a hit after NC State commit Jaylen Samuels caught a 4-yard pass from Scaife at the Dillon 41. Randal Davis pounced on the ball to give the ’Cats the ball and start another scoring opportunity that was stopped when McCall threw his first ever interception. Safety Tony Reid picked off the pass at the Mallard Creek 1-yard line and returned it eight yards. The Mavericks again moved the ball on the passing arm of Scaife all the way to the Dillon 13, but on a third and ten play with the clock running out in the half, Shy’Keem Blue sacked the Appalachian bound quarterback at the 15 on the last play of the half.

Anthony Blue put the Wildcats ahead of the Mavericks with just a minute gone in the third quarter when he broke up the middle and out ran the secondary for a 59-yard touchdown, and Grimsley’s second PAT gave the ’Cats their first lead at 14-7.

Kevin Rucker returned a Randal Davis 39-yard punt to the Wildcat 16 near the four minute mark of the quarter and on the third play from scrimmage, Samuels had his second rushing touchdown of the evening and a 14-14 tie and two minutes later, the speedster took a handoff and ran for a 58-yard TD to put his team on top by a 21-14 score.

Back came the Wildcats in the final stanza to pull even with the Mavericks again. McCall completed four of four passes on the drive and scrambled for a 13-yard gain to set up a scoring toss to Eri’Reon Hayes with 5:27 remaining in the game.

The kickoff after a 15-yard roughing the kicker penalty on the PAT was walked off, and the Mavericks began the game winning drive.

McCall was injured during the final Dillon series, but coach Hayes said that he was ok and will probably start against Lake View next week.

The stats pretty well told the story of the game with Mallard Creek racking up 18 first downs (five on the last drive) to Dillon’s 12 and the Mavericks led in total yardage with a 387 to 354 edge. Anthony Blue finished the game with 107 yards rushing despite being hampered by leg cramps.

The Wildcats will be in Lake View Friday night at 7:30 p.m. and the Mavericks are scheduled to take on Butler of Monroe, NC, which handed Mallard Creek their final loss of the season in the play offs last year, 21-0.

Photos by Johnnie Daniels/THE DILLON HERALD. Click images below to view at full size!