The Bridge City Cardinals are the District 10-4A, Division I champions. The Cardinals won their fourth straight game 49-31 over the Navasota Rattlers Friday night at Larry B. Ward Stadium in Bridge City to clinch their first district championship since 2002.
Bridge City (6-2, 4-0) literally ran over the Rattlers grinding out 526 yards and 28 first downs all on the ground. Navasota (2-7, 2-2) was hoping with a win Friday night to force a three-way tie for the district lead with the Silsbee Tigers, but the Rattlers could not stop the Cardinals’ Slot-T.
Coach Dwayne DuBois in his second year as the head coach of Bridge City, his alma mater, said he was speechless following the district clinching victory. “My hat is off to our kids, our players, they bought in to what we’ve been talking about with trust and love and hold on to that rope,” DuBois praised the Cardinals. “They’ve rallied together, and you know what they’ve become a true team in every sense of the word and I couldn’t be prouder of them.”
The Cardinals showed the team concept in their distribution of running the football. Ten different Cardinals carried the ball at least once. More impressive was the top four Bridge City ball carriers all sniffed 100 yards on the night, two of them going over the century mark.
Navasota showed it was not to be taken lightly with the first possession of the game driving 73 yards for the touchdown and the initial lead of the game. Jeb Malek threw a shuttle pass to Ladadrien Walker good for 29 yards on the first play from scrimmage. Two more first downs were picked up on the ground before Malek found Deeidre Richardson wide open at the goal line for a 20-yard touchdown pass. Luis Baeza added the point after to make the score 7-0 with only 2:37 gone in the first quarter.
It would take Bridge City a little longer, but it responded with an 11-play, 67-yard drive to tie the game. Of the 11 running plays only one was for more than 10 yards and only one was for less than three yards. Cayce Draper got his first of three touchdowns on the night from 5 yards out with 4:16 still to play in the initial stanza.
Next possession the Cardinals appeared to be on a similar track to another score before they lost a fumble at the Navasota 24. Turnovers were an unfortunate statistic Bridge City led in the game losing three of four fumbles.
Defensively Bridge City forced a second straight three-and-out by the Rattlers and took over at its 45. Quarterback Byron Trahan carried three times on the six-play drive. His third tote was a quarterback sneak which he bulled for 19 yards and a touchdown to put the Cardinals in front to stay. Trahan finished the night with 15 carries good for 93 yards.
Malek connected with Eric Lattimore for a 53-yard completion to setup the Rattlers at the Bridge City 24. The two teamed up again for 11 yards to give Navasota a first-and-goal at the nine. The drive stalled and Baeza kicked a 30-yard field goal with 6:07 left in the first half to make the score 14-10.
It was time for another patented Bridge City chew up the clock scoring drive. The Cardinals actually overcame two penalties and drove 68 yards. Hunter Denton scored the touchdown on his first carry of the night with a sweep to the right good for 18 yards. Alfredo Heraldez’s kick made the score 21-10 with just over two minutes left in the half.
Both teams actually threatened to score in the closing two minutes. Two penalties cost Navasota dearly including a procedure penalty on a pass from punt formation which would have been good for 32 yards to the Cardinals’ 30. Bridge City then drove to the Navasota 25 before coughing up a second lost fumble in the final 30 seconds.
The second half started with a bang and almost two bangs. Denton returned the Rattlers’ kickoff to start the third quarter 80 yards for a touchdown. This was after the first kickoff went out-of-bounds and Bridge City elected to have Navasota re-kick it after the penalty. Bridge City then kicked off and the Rattlers’ Walker went 97 yards for an apparent touchdown. Back at the Navasota 20 a yellow flag wiped out the spectacular return.
The Rattlers’ star running back Keyondrick Philio had been held to just 31 yards in the first half. Philio popped one for 45 yards on his first carry of the second half to give Navasota a first-and-ten at the Cardinals’ 20. The Bridge City defense rose to the occasion to stop Philio for a loss and then a short gain on the next two plays. Malek threw two passes which were incomplete turning the ball back over to the Cardinals.
Thirteen plays later Bridge City went up by four scores. Draper carried four of the 13 running plays including the touchdown from the three. The drive used up almost five minutes and the Cardinals led 35-10 with five minutes left in the third quarter.
The lead would be cut to 18 as Navasota engineered a 9-play, 80-yard drive of its own. Malek completed two passes for first downs, and Philio rushed for two more. The touchdown came on a 13-yard scramble by Malek with just over two minutes left in the third period.
Draper reached the 100-yard mark on the previous drive. He would put an exclamation point on his night with the next possession. His 38-yard scoring jaunt was his final carry of the game giving him 144 yards on 14 carries and elevating Bridge City to a 42-17 advantage just seven seconds into the final quarter.
Desperate to get back in the game Navasota gambled on its next possession and went for it on fourth-and-three at its own 25. Malek’s pass was broken up and the Cardinals took over with a chance to ice the game.
They did exactly that despite a chop block penalty which wiped out a touchdown run by Trahan. Two plays later Max Baker went around right end, broke a tackle, and sprinted into the end zone for a 34-yard touchdown. Baker just missed the century mark with 97 yards on 11 carries. Patrick Morris failed to find the end zone on the night, but he did find 101 yards on 12 carries.
Not giving up Navasota scored two consolation touchdowns in just under two minutes. Malek threw touchdown passes of 38 yards to Lattimore and 8 yards to Elidrick Powell. On the night the Rattler quarterback was 18 of 31 passing for 267 yards with no interceptions.
The regular season ends next week with Bridge City traveling to Huffman. Coach DuBois stated he is not looking past the Falcons next Friday. “We want to play a lot more than two more games,” DuBois emphasized. “It’s going to be a dogfight next week at their place it’s going to be a tremendous ball game. We’re going to go one game at a time, and then we’ll look at the playoffs after that we’re not even going to look ahead we’re going to focus on Huffman. We’re going to try to win this thing outright with no tiebreakers.”
Navasota plays at home against the Little Cypress-Mauriceville Bears which clinched a playoff spot Friday night. That game will probably determine third place in the district.
-Dan Perrine, KOGT-
NAV 7 3 7 14- 31
BC 7 14 14 14- 49
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