Decatur Drops Third Straight

Before a tiny, mostly silent Friday night crowd at the Decatur High Stadium, featuring few students and no marching band, Maynard Jackson played Decatur’s youthful secondary like a resounding drum, composing a 24-21 victory.

Maynard completed eight mostly lengthy passes, sending Decatur to its third straight loss, and probably the most painful. Heading into the 2011 season, it wasn’t a stretch believing Decatur could be 5-0 heading into its Sept. 30 date at Buford.

But now 1-3, a second straight winning season for Decatur is beginning to appear as remote as one of those unnamed Pacific Islands.

“I’m sick about it,” said Decatur head coach Price Jones. “We were definitely concerned about their passing attack. They have an outstanding, athletic quarterback (junior Shadarius Ferguson) and we have a young secondary. Bottom line, our worst nightmare became reality – they made the big plays.”

None was bigger than the final play of the first half.

Decatur took an early 7-0 lead in the first quarter on a 12-play, 73-yard drive culminating in sophomore Nick Bentley’s one-yard touchdown run.

Very late in the half, the Bulldogs seemed to put the first, and possibly the second and third nails in Maynard’s coffin with another cooly efficient drive, this one 75 yards in 10 plays. When Chris Hambie slipped in from the one, Decatur led 14-0 with 20.9 seconds left until intermission, and the only thing missing was a funeral dirge from the absentee band.

But after the ensuing kickoff, Maynard took over on its 27, two plays took it to the Decatur 43, and then, with the clock hitting zero, Ferguson unloaded a long sideline pass to Jamari O’Neal, who simply outran three Decatur defenders for the catch and touchdown. And though the extra point was missed, Maynard served notice cutting the margin to 14-6 at halftime. Forget the dirge, forget the nails, this one was a living, breathing game again.

“That really killed us,” said senior linebacker/fullback Chris Hambie. “We knew they were gonna pass – we’d been practicing against it all week. And up until that play (only 17 total yards passing), we’d stopped them pretty good.”

It didn’t help, despite its two long fourth-quarter drives, Decatur never could establish a ground game, rushing 37 times for only 103 yards or 2.8 yards per carry. “I’ll have to see the film,” Jones said, “but I don’t think our offensive line played well at all. I don’t care if they’re blitzing linebackers or whatever, you gotta block somebody.”

Further, after last week’s iconic game of seven receptions for 322 yards, wide receiver Terryon Robinson must’ve felt like he was trapped in a phone booth Friday. Quarterback Vito Antinozzi threw to him only twice and neither landed anywhere close to Robinson’s area code.

“They pretty much triple teamed me all night,” Robinson said. “They had a corner on me, a linebacker two or three yards to my inside, and then a safety helped out. There was no way to get open.”

Maynard scored again on a 60-yard touchdown down pass, a throw deflected by Decatur’s Perez Cowan right into the waiting hands of O’Neal to cut Decatur’s lead to 14-12 with 5:37 left in the third quarter.

On Decatur’s very next play from scrimmage, Antinozzi threw a wobbly flat pass that was easily picked by Stan Brown and returned 65 yards for a touchdown, and in a matter of 22 seconds, Decatur’s 14-6 lead went to an 18-14 deficit (Maynard would miss all four of its extra points on this night, perhaps some sort of dubious modern record).

The second most crucial sequence began early in the fourth quarter. In eight plays Decatur drove from its own 39 to Maynard’s eight, the highlight a 42-yard completion from Antinozzi to Perez Cowan. But when Decatur landed in the red zone, as has been the case several times this season, it was betrayed by its impotent run game. After three inefficient plays the Bulldogs faced fourth and goal from the eight and, choosing to go for it, Antinozzi badly overthrew Robinson in the end zone’s far corner.”

“Actually it was a good play by Vito,” Robinson said. “The weird thing was, it was the only time all night they played me one on one, but I was too boxed in down there, I had no room. He made the best choice by overthrowing me like he did.”

Jones defended his decision to go for fourth and eight instead of kicking a field goal, likely an easy chip shot for place kicker Jason Barefoot. “We didn’t have a holder,” he said. “Our two holders are Terez (Cowan, suspended for this game) and Kentrell (Pattillo, who hurt his shoulder at the end of the first half). Vito said he could hold, but he’s never done it before and I didn’t want to risk it.”

Maynard took over on its eight, penalties backed it up to the two before Ferguson dumped off a 51 yard swing pass to Mario McClain. Three plays later, including another long pass completion (32 yards), fullback Quintin Bryant ran a toss sweep 12 yards for a touchdown making it 24-14.

Decatur scored late, a 7-play, 68 yard drive, featuring superb catches by I.V.Dennard (16 yards) and Perez again (21 yards), and ending with Antinozzi’s one-yard touchdown romp. But it was too little too late as Decatur fell to 1-2 while Maynard goes to 2-1.

In the game’s weirdest statistic, Decatur ran 20 more plays (59 to Maynard’s 39), but had only 285 yards total offense to the visiting team’s 330. Maynard’s O’Neal had an MVP night with four receptions for 120 yards and two touchdowns.

On the Decatur side, Jones cited Hambie for doing “a real good job on both sides of the ball.” He scored his first touchdown this season, had pass receptions of 16 and 18 yards, while also racking up five tackles and one assist.

Decatur next plays this Thursday against regional foe Therrell, a 7:30 kickoff at Grady Stadium.