PROCTORVILLE — As soon as Fairland’s game-winning field goal went through the uprights, chaos began.
Angry parents, players and coaches rushed onto the field at Jim Mayo Stadium from the Nelsonville-York sideline as a fight nearly broke out at midfield. Two overwhelmed police officers found themselves in the middle of the scuffle trying to bring order to the madness.
They were angry because they felt that their Buckeyes were robbed.
The referees called back two game-sealing interceptions in the final 20 seconds of Nelsonville-York’s heartbreaking 30-28 loss that ended its season Saturday night.
First, the refs called a Critter McDonald interception in the end zone incomplete after originally calling it a touchback. Two plays later, the flags came out when the referees called pass interference on what should’ve been the last play of the game as Ethan Douglas stepped in front of an untouched Fairland receiver.
The Buckeyes should have been celebrating their miraculous 13-point fourth-quarter comeback. Instead, as the dust settled and the two parties separated, the Nelsonville-York players fell to their knees, speechless, looking desperately for answers as to how their season ended.
There were no answers.
Head coach Rusty Richards could only console his players as they watched the other team celebrate on the other side of the field.
“I’ve been playing football since second grade and I’m 45,” Richards said. “I haven’t felt too many times where, I guess the word is cheated. Right there in those last couple of plays, I felt like they didn’t want us to win. That’s all I can say.”
Not often would a team that only led for 27 seconds of the entire game feel cheated, but Saturday’s game was different.
Nelsonville-York can only watch now as Fairland advances to the regional semifinal that it was sure would be held at Boston Field. The score is final.
“We can complain to the state, hopefully these guys (the referees) don’t get another playoff game,” Richards said. “Other than that, we have to live with that score up on the scoreboard.”
The Buckeyes could’ve been out of the game at any point. They were losing from the start after allowing a 61-yard touchdown on the third play of the game. Despite trailing for more than 46 minutes, they kept playing.
“I asked the underclassmen, ‘every time we had a chance to quit this year, did the seniors let you quit?’” Richards said. “They said no. I said, ‘that’s your job in the future.’ Buckeye football, we don’t quit.”
Facing a 13-point deficit at the start of the fourth quarter, junior quarterback Drew Carter took over for Nelsonville-York. Carter ran the ball seven times for 61 yards and ran in the touchdown to cut Fairland’s lead to six.
Carter got the ball again with just under three minutes to play and led the offense down the field once again. It looked like the drive would be over after he took a sack on third down.
On fourth-and-13, Carter heaved a 24-yard touchdown pass to Alec Taylor at the goal line on what he thought would be the game-winning score.
The exhausted quarterback came back to the sideline overwhelmed with emotion from the thrill of victory. The comeback was complete, or so he thought.
But as the clock struck zero and the ball went through the uprights, Carter’s tears were changed to those that only come from defeat.
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