Winning championships isn’t easy. Winning back-to-back is extremely difficult. That’s exactly what the 4A Division II state championship game was for West Orange-Stark, extremely difficult, as they were able to fend off an upset minded Sweetwater team 24-6 to win their second consecutive title.
West Orange Stark’s first drive was methodical; showing what everyone knew their offense was capable of, then on their ninth play of the drive, the snap was fumbled and Sweetwater’s Luke James picked it up and ran 96 yards for the score to take a 6-0 lead. WOS looked shell shocked; the defending state champions didn’t seem to know how to react to being down.
“It was one play in the first quarter of the game,” junior linebacker Jerrick Spencer said. “We told each other we have three more quarters and bunch of plays left in this quarter to make it up.”
They finally got on the scoreboard on their final drive of the first half on a Jeremiah Shaw two-yard score taking a 7-6 lead into the intermission, with the way they had played in the first half was a huge confidence booster.
“That was huge for us,” head coach Cornel Thompson said about getting points before halftime. “We go in and make our minor adjustments up one, and told our guys what they needed to do to complete the deal.”
The West Orange-Stark (16-0) defense was impenetrable, holding Sweetwater (13-2) to 148 yards. For the season, the Mustangs allowed 63 points for the entire season, and never allowed more than 21 in a game.
“We’ve had a lot of great defenses here,” Thompson said. “We’ve played in 5A, 4A so it’s hard to compare defenses but this is the best defense I’ve ever seen in 4A Division II.”
On the first play of the second half, Jarron Morris jumped a slant route to intercept a Chris Thompson pass and took it back to the Sweetwater six-yard line. The offense wasn’t able to break through and had to settle for a Chad Dallas 20-yard field goal to make it 10-6.
In the fourth quarter, Jack Dallas was picked off in the end zone by Sweetwater DB Kobe Clark, who made a spectacular catch in the end zone. But the Mustang defense did what they do, and they forced a turnover, a Jeremiah Shaw interception that led to a one-yard touchdown run by Dallas and a 17-6 lead with 7:58 left in the game.
Just for good measure Justin Brown, who had been injured earlier in the season put a bow on this game with a 31-yard interception return for a touchdown with 5:38 left, making it 24-6.
