By Amy Thrash, Sports Reporter • amy@southerntorch.com
FORT PAYNE, Ala. — The Etowah Blue Devils gave the Fort Payne Wildcats their first loss of the season on Friday night, 26-20. The game was delayed for over two hours due to lighting.
The Fort Payne Wildcats struck first with a 32-yard field goal by Alex McPherson, to give the Wildcats the 3-0 lead, with 10:11 remaining in the first quarter. With 5:19 remaining in the first, the Blue Devils’ intercepted a pass and returned it for a touchdown, giving Etowah the 6-3 lead. After the Wildcats fumbled the ball, the Blue Devils scored from 8-yards out to bring the score to 13-3, at the end of the first.
In the second quarter with 10:15 remaining, the Blue Devils scored on a 33-yard touchdown run. The PAT was blocked, giving Etowah the 19-3 lead.
With 4:40 left in the third quarter, Fort Paynes Hunter Love dashed in the endzone from 4-yards out. The 2-point conversion was good ,making the score 19-11.
In the fourth quarter with 11:48 remaining in the game, the Wildcats defense scored and tried for a 2-point conversion but came up short, making the score 19-17. Etowah broke around the end to score, giving them the 26-17 advantage with 2:16 left in the game. McPherson nailed a 42-yard field goal to make the score 26-20. McPherson then got the ball back for the offense when Darwin Camp recovered the onside kick. With .31 seconds left in the game the Blue Devils intercepted the ball to take the 26-20 win over the Fort Payne Wildcats.
“It was a crazy night” said Fort Payne Head Coach Chris Elmore. ” We had 3 separate lighting delays that added up to over 2 hours of setting and waiting to play. The game did not finish until after midnight. We played well at times in adverse field conditions. But, once again we had too many turnovers and mistakes and this time it caught up with us. Our players played really hard but we just didn’t play well enough to win We will learn from this game and move forward.”
The Fort Payne Wildcats will travel tonight to Huntsville to take on Lee.
