SILVER BLUFF 42, BARNWELL 35
PETTICOAT JUNCTION — With Al Lown in the stadium Friday night, it was only appropriate for Silver Bluff football coach De’Angelo Bryant to take a page out of his former head coach’s playbook.
The Bulldogs had the ball at the Barnwell 43-yard line and were facing a fourth-and-2 with 1:02 remaining in the Class AA Lower State championship game when Bryant called a timeout.
Sophomore running back Traevon Dunbar gestured like he wanted the ball, and the Bulldogs met on the sideline to talk over the decision. Get the first down, and the game is over. Get stopped short, and suddenly their rivals have the ball back for a chance to tie the game with great field position.
Bryant sent his offense back out on the field, and the handoff went to Nick Brown. He fought through the initial contact and fell forward to the 40.
First down. Ball game.
“I think I pulled an Al Lown back in 2000 (Lower State final against Barnwell), because he did the same thing and walked in the huddle, and I remember us being in there and we basically told him we wanted to go for it,” Bryant recalled. “He dialed up a great play and we hit it down in the end zone, so I felt it was only fitting to have him at the game and be able to do the same thing.”
With Barnwell out of timeouts, all that was left to do was snap it to Maleik Williams to take a knee. The last few seconds bled off the clock, finalizing the 42-35 win and punching third-ranked Silver Bluff’s ticket to next week’s state championship game.
The Bulldogs last played for a title in 2015 in what turned out to be Lown’s final game. Now, Bryant has his alma mater back in the big game against No. 2 Gray Collegiate at 7 p.m. next Friday at Benedict College.
“It’s a blessing. To be able to do it as a player and then to turn around and be able to do it as a coach, it’s just simply a blessing,” Bryant said. “I’m so proud of my guys. I’m so proud of my coaching staff. For this community, it was great to come out here, even on both sides, to see that this thing has gotten back to where it was.”
This game was nothing like the regular-season meeting a month ago, which Silver Bluff won 55-20 by outscoring Barnwell 41-0 in the second half. That started a three-game losing streak for the Warhorses, who entered the playoffs as a No. 4 seed but reeled off three consecutive road wins to set up the rematch.
Silver Bluff (11-0) senior Darius Dixon scored two fourth-quarter touchdowns on his only two touches of the night, and the Bulldogs led 42-28 with 4:34 remaining.
Barnwell (9-5) quickly struck back, with quarterback Weston Sandifer hitting Clay Pender for 42 yards and then finding Cameron Austin for a 38-yard touchdown to make it 42-35 with 3:10 remaining.
The Warhorses went for the onside kick on what was a nerve-wracking night for Silver Bluff’s special teams. The Bulldogs recovered, though, and went to work on running out the clock.
“They made a few more plays than we made,” said Barnwell head coach Dwayne Garrick. “I can’t be any more proud of our kids and what they did, and how hard they played, how hard they fought. We’re young. And when I say young, I mean we’re young. I’ve said that since day one. ... We’re playing with three or four freshmen on both sides of the ball. That’s good for the future.”
Williams was a perfect 8-for-8 passing for 218 yards and two touchdowns, and he rushed for 141 yards and a score on six carries. His first touchdown was a screen pass that Arthur Walker took 73 yards on the Bulldogs’ second play of the game for a 7-0 lead, and then he found Dixon for a 72-yard score on the first play of the fourth quarter to go back ahead 35-28. His big run of the night was another tie-breaker, a 69-yarder with 8:37 left in the third quarter to go ahead 28-21.
“Tonight, when we needed him to put us on his back, he did really, really well. I’m extremely proud of Maleik,” Bryant said of his junior quarterback. ”... He’s a student of the game. He’s a great athlete. More than anything, he loves his teammates. I’m extremely proud of Maleik and the team.”
Barnwell’s Tyler Smith, who last week surpassed 2,000 rushing yards for the season, had 144 yards on 34 carries, and his 5-yard score late in the first quarter came after a Silver Bluff muffed punt and tied the game at 7 apiece.
A 48-yard run by Williams on the next drive put Silver Bluff back in business, and Traevon Dunbar found the end zone from 7 yards out. Dunbar finished the game with 96 yards and two scores on 20 carries, and his first touchdown put the Bulldogs back in front 14-7.
That lead lasted 38 seconds, as a 70-yard run by Mario Jones put Barnwell at the 1. Quarterback Weston Sandifer powered it in from there, squaring the game at 14 with 10:29 left in the half.
The Bulldogs responded with a methodical 75-yard touchdown drive that ended with an 8-yard run by Dunbar for a 21-14 lead that the Bulldogs carried into halftime.
Barnwell wasted no time tying it back up, though, as a couple of big Smith runs set up Jones, who finished with 107 yards on nine carries, for a 7-yard touchdown with 9:22 left in the third quarter.
Williams struck for his long touchdown run just 45 seconds later, another one of the big plays Garrick cautioned that his team couldn’t afford to make a habit of allowing. Still, his team refused to go away. Smith converted two fourth downs inside the Silver Bluff 20, and Sandifer had another 1-yard touchdown run on the last play of the third quarter.
That left Silver Bluff, which had won its first 10 games by an average margin of 42 points, in unfamiliar territory - tied with only 12 minutes to play.
“We knew adversity was going to hit us at some point, and this was definitely the game that I think we got four quarters of adversity,” Bryant said. “I was just really happy with the way our guys really responded and took care of business tonight.”