It was there for William Monroe football, right up until it wasn’t.
“When you’re playing a team equal to you, it’s who makes less mistakes and we made more,” said William Monroe coach Jon Rocha. “We beat ourselves.”
William Monroe fell 13-10 to Brentsville Friday night after leading from its opening drive until there was just 4:12 left in the game, missing a chance to start Northwestern District play 1-0 while losing to the Tigers in a close contest for the third-straight season.
“Against Spotsylvania and Kettle Run, our previous two wins we were down at the half, so we always believe that we have an opportunity to bounce back,” said Brentsville coach Joe Mullinax. “We have a lot of heart.”
The Dragons came out and executed their game plan to perfection for most of the game, running the ball 10 straight plays on its opening drive, scoring with 6:17 to play on a Dupree Rucker touchdown from 16 yards out. Rucker rushed for 70 yards on the opening drive and went on to finish with 166 yards on 33 touches. The Dragons, who’s run game also got a boost from fullback with 43 yards on five touches, then tacked on a field goal from Will Auer to cap a 13-play drive and push the lead to 10-0 midway through the second quarter.
“As well as we’re starting to play, when you’re playing a team (like Brentsville) those mistakes are going to count,” Rocha said. “They say you can point to one or two plays but there’s about seven of them that we can go back to.”
The defense also stepped up early on, holding Brentsville scoreless in the first half. David Mack had two first half sacks and Isaiah Taylor had another while the Dragons forced a couple of three and outs.
Brentsville finally broke through with a Kyler Cornwell touchdown setup by a long run from Brady Hoad with 2:39 to play in the third. That’s where things started sputtering for the Dragons, who turned the ball over on downs after an ill-fated reverse try on third and long. The defense answered the bell with Drew Hoffacker making a big stop on third down to force a punt. Looking for a spark, Monroe came out in the wildcat with Jeremy Savoie running the ball. Brentsville’s defense stepped up and made two straight stops after a short gain on first.
That gave Brentsville the ball back with plenty of time, and that’s when senior captain Travis Stanley came up with the game’s decisive play.
“He’s kind of like a coach on the field, he’s matured in such a fashion that he’s a captain,” Mullinax said. “We knew if we kept attacking inside, that if we took a shot at the right time to get a screen and give him that space, he’d have a window.”
Stanley raced 65 yards to paydirt off the screen from Guy Hayes, putting Brentsville up 13-10 with 4:12 to play after a missed PAT. That could’ve been a huge miss, especially when William Monroe’s Jared Knights connected with Logan Barbour (who had four catches for 85 yards) for a huge gain down the sideline inside the 10. But a personal foul back at the line of scrimmage erased that gain. Monroe could’ve turned back to the run and scored or kicked a field goal with the reliable Auer to tie the game but the penalty snuffed out that chance. Brentsville’s Tyler Talavera picked off a pass a couple of plays later to ice the game.
“That one puts us at the five and with no time and the way we were playing defense — nobody feels as bad as what that kid does,” Rocha said. “That’s something we didn’t have last week, we didn’t have the personal fouls, the mistake.”
William Monroe will try and bounce back on the road against Skyline next week.
