Hartselle survives rival Cullman with last second field goal
For the Enquirer
It took 47 minutes and 59 seconds to determine the outcome of Friday’s Hartselle rivalry game against Cullman. As time expired, a Micheal Sumner 31-yard field goal gave the Tigers a come-from-behind win over the Bearcats.
“My team showed tremendous heart and fight tonight as they battled with a very good Cullman team,” coach Bert Newton said. “Our defense played well tonight and kept us in the game as our offense struggled through the first three quarters.” Cullman got the ball first and drove inside the Hartselle side of the field before the Tigers’ defense forced a punt. But the Hartselle offense struggled to move the ball before being forced to punt. They had a fourth-down fake punt run for 25 yards called back due to a holding call leading to the punt.
The Bearcats once again drove into Hartselle territory, but linebacker Jameson Falciani and the Tiger defense stopped the Bearcats’ advancement. Falciani intercepted a Cullman pass and returned it to the 43-yard line.
A failed fake punt on the Tiger’s next possession gave Cullman excellent field possession late in the first quar-ter. The Bearcats capitalized on the Hartselle error with an eight-play, 38-yard touchdown drive to take a 7-0 lead early in the second quarter.
Hartselle threatened to tie the game late in the third quarter with a drive that got to the Cullman two-yard line, but penalties forced the Tigers to attempt a field goal that missed to the right, leaving the Bearcats with the lead heading into the fourth.
The Hartselle defense kept the Tigers alive as they dominated the fourth quarter, holding Cullman to only 16 total yards and -7 yards rushing.
The Hartselle offense used a 17-play, 82-yard drive that took 6:10 off the clock to tie the game at 7-7. The touchdown came on a seven-yard pass from Noah Lee to Cain Falciani with 5:09 left in the game. The Tiger’s rushing attack, led by Jaheim Pruitt, ran for 48 yards while Lee passed for 34 yards.
The defense held the Bearcats to 20 yards on the next drive and forced them to punt the ball back to Hartselle with 2:15 remaining.
Lee started the drive with a 25-yard completion to Markus Tapscott and followed it up three plays later with a 14-yard pass to Tapscott, moving the ball from the 25-yard line to the Cullman 32-yard line. A fourth-down 30-yard completion from Lee to Cain Falciani moved the ball inside the Bearcats’ 3-yard line. The Tigers tried running in for the score but were stopped twice on the ground and once in the air, forcing Hartselle to attempt to win the game by kicking a field goal.
With less than three seconds remaining in the game, Sumner stepped into a 31-yard field goal from the left hash, drilling through the uprights to give Hartselle the hard-fought 10-7 win over Cullman.
The Hartselle offense finished with 290 total yards, 157 rushing and 137 passing. After being held to 63 yards in the first half, they had 227 yards in the second half.
Lee finished 11-of-24 for 137 yards and a touchdown. Tapscott had six catches for 65 yards, while Cain Falciani had three for 44 yards and a touchdown. Carter Lee and Pruitt each had 64 yards rushing to lead the team, while Jayden Morris added 23 yards.
The Tigers’ defense held Cullman to 168 total yards, 111 rushing and 57 passing, and the Bearcats to 71 total yards in the second half.
“The defense played a tremendous game considering all of the circumstances,” Newton said. “They wanted to make sure the anything that Cullman got wasn’t going to come easy.” Hartselle (5-1, 3-0) will host Athens (5-1, 2-1) in another region matchup on Friday night.
