Up just a point and facing fourth and four inside Louisa County’s territory, Fluvanna coach Jason Barnett didn’t want to give the ball back to the Lions with 3:39 to play.
So he turned to Dashon Tibbs.
“We wanted to put the ball in Tibbs’ hands,” Barnett said. “I looked at him in the huddle and said ‘This is why you’re here, to get us this first down.’ He smiled and said yes sir.”
Then the senior quarterback did Barnett one better, ripping off a 36-yard sprint for a touchdown that helped spark Fluvanna to a 34-19 victory over Louisa, the Flucos’ first win over Fluvanna since 2002.
“It was the first time I’ve ever gotten water poured on me and that was pretty fun,” Barnett said. “It had been 10 years and I think the kids realized how important that was as a program. (Tonight) we didn’t let bad things overtake us.”
Fluvanna changed up its approach by installing some single wing elements, an approach that helped the Flucos hang tough against certain teams last year. It also put a lot of pressure on a young offensive line to adopt an entirely new style on the fly. The change of paced worked well as Tibbs and Jovan Burton both put together 100-yard nights, including Tibb’s 197-yard, two-touchdown performance. Burton had 104 yards, the bulk of it on a 62-yard touchdown midway through the first quarter.
Fluvanna went into halftime with the lead when Tibbs found Burton for a 23-yard touchdown to take a 14-13 advantage.
“Going to the half with the lead was a big deal for us,” Barnett said. “We didn’t give up (nearly) anything in the second half and our offensive line did a great job.”
Tibbs scored twice on the ground in the fourth quarter, then Burton’s 20-yard touchdown with 2:05 to play iced the game for the Flucos. Louisa managed just a single score after the break, a 1-yard plunge by Zack Jackson. Jackson finished with 119 yards on the ground and 86 through the air.
Fluvanna contained the explosive Louisa quarterback by slanting toward the sweeps out of the Lions’ predominantly single wing approach and spying Jackson. The gamble that Louisa wouldn’t start hammering the counter seemed to work, though the Flucos did surrender 271 yards of total offense.
The Lions couldn’t punch it in often enough though and struggled on third down (2 of 8) and fourth down (1 of 3).
Deion Johnson had a sold game with seven total tackles, five of them solo stops. He also had 35 yards on four catches on offense.
For Fluvanna though, it was a milestone win, though Barnett was quick to point out that its impact won’t be known for a little while.
“I will know a lot more about where this stacks up when we go to Powhatan,” Barnett said. “Every once and awhile we’ll take a big step forward but we never follow it up. This has the capability of being a big step. We just have to understand this has to be an every week, every day thing for us.”
