Cougars and Rams Go Toe to Toe into OT.

Cougars and Rams Go Toe to Toe into OT.

The scene was set... the Franklin Courgars were returning to the Sun Bowl where they held the state of Texas spellbound last year as they rolled past Coronado in the Westside Bowl and beat a heavily favored Midland team. But the Cougars have not quite re-loaded yet as they fell to the Montwood Rams in OT 34-27.

It could have gone either way with each team looking like they would end the game with a spectacular drive. Franklin was in control. The Cougar Defense was acting like they were last years model. They held the Rams of Montwood scoreless throughout the first half and led 6-0.

Franklin then drove all the way down to score on a between the tackles run by their RB. The score was now a commanding 13-0. The game was supposed to be close but the Cougars were making it look like it might be a blowout.

Wrong. With 3 minutes to play before half-time, the Rams mounted a lightning quick passing game and stampeded down the field. But the Cougar defense was holding at the 33 yard line with only .7 seconds left after Gabe Flores, Montwood QB, threw a long ball out of bounds.

They say that the game of football is a game of inches. Well, that could not have been more true tonight. The Sun Bowl time clock left the door open for the Rams to get one more play. Flores dropped back and without any pressure put on by the Cougars he threw a strike to Danny Perez for what looked like was going to be a touchdown. But, a Franklin defender who was beat on the play by a step made a last ditch effort to block the pass. He got his right hand up and hit the ball... but, instead of the ball falling incomplete... it floated into the arms of Perez who was one yard into the end zone.

This gave Montwood all the momentum they needed and it looked like the dam that the Franklin defense had so meticulously built was now about to break... which it did in the second half.

The last second first half score by the Rams also had the effect of cooling the Cougar offense. To start the second half Franlin could not get two first downs in a row.

After leading 13-0 the Rams came back and scored 19 straight points with one of their drives being helped by a personal foul for “Unnecessary Roughness” as a Ram reciever was thrown down after being pushed out of bounds. On another play the Cougar defense fell asleep as Flores, on a QB keeper, ran off of left end for 28 yards into the end zone... untouched.

However, the Rams could not convert on their extra points and the Cougars only trailed by 6. The two missed extra points would have an impact as the game progressed.

But as it looked like the Rams would just roll past the Cougars, the Rams, after driving down to the Cougar 8 and having to backup due to a penalty... missed a field goal that would have given them a 9 point lead.

Then with time running out, the Cougar frustration fused together an incredible 80 yard TD pass play from QB Billy Hayes, who had been harassed by the Ram defense, to........ who caught the ball with one step on the Ram defender and ran 50 yards with the defender unable to make the tackle.

The game was tied. 19-19. The extra points for Montwood were now looming huge. The extra point for the Cougars could win the game. The kick was good. Franklin had clawed its way out of a coffin and was leading for the first time since that half ending TD for Montwood when they had led 6-0.

(Photos: Brax - Valley Publishing Company)

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Editor, Upper Valley Beacon