OAKWOOD — Beat-up and with a makeshift lineup, Flowery Branch turned to the things it has excelled at all season Friday night in a huge Region 7-4A battle with West Hall: defense and special teams.
The Falcons used a pair of long kick returns to set up touchdowns and got another dominating performance from the defense to take a much-needed 27-7 win over the Spartans at Spartans Field.
The defense was nearly impenetrable holding West Hall to minus-32 yards rushing and just 126 total yards for the game. The Spartans only score came on a 95-yard drive midway through the fourth quarter that was capped with a 17-yard pass from Clayton Jenkins to Devon Williams to pull within 20-7.
“Oh yeah, the defense played great tonight” Flowery Branch coach Ben Hall said. “We gave up one there late but the defense played great and the special teams, I’m proud of the way they executed. You know we got a PAT blocked, but other than that it was a pretty good night.”
A 47-yard kickoff return by Chase Dial-Watson to the West Hall 7 to open the game set up a short Connor Lawson touchdown for a 7-0 less than 90 seconds in. Later in the first quarter Dial-Watson scampered 26 yards to the Spartans 3 to set up an 8-yard touchdown pass from freshman quarterback David Renard to D.J. Brown to make it 14-0.
In the third quarter Brown return a West Hall punt inside the Spartans 5 setting up Jerzee Allentini’s 1-yard plunge for a 20-0 lead.
“Well we had young guys that stepped in to play tonight and execute what we ask them to do, so it was one of those nights where they had an opportunity to move up from the JV level to the varsity level and I'm proud of the ones that played,” Hall said.
Renard was one of those young guys to step up. He was making his first start for the injured Elijah Gainey. Dial-Watson, who plays almost exclusively on defense, was a catalyst in all three phases as he scored a touchdown on offense on a 10-yard run for the final score as well as picking off a West Hall pass in the final minutes to help preserve the win. He finished with 77 yards rushing on 14 carries.
The win clinched a playoff spot for the Falcons (7-2, 3-2 Region 7-4A) while the loss for the Spartans (2-7, 1-4) puts them in a must-win situation next week. The Spartans will need to beat Chestatee, get a lopsided loss by White County against No. 1 Blessed Trinity, and hope for a big Falcons win over Denmark to send it to tiebreakers for a playoff spot.
However, a Denmark win next week over Flowery Branch would give the Danes the No. 3 seed and put the Falcon in the No. 4 spot and eliminate everyone else.
