CARTHAGE, Mo. — Nursing a 14-6 lead with only minutes until halftime, the Carthage Tigers started a drive at their own 8-yard line. The offense advanced the ball to its 30, but faced a fourth-and-1 situation.
Knowing there was minimal time remaining and that his team would receive the opening kickoff of the second half, coach Jon Guidie planned to punt the ball away and hoped to take the one-score advantage into the break. The guys who would have to pave the way for that 1 more yard had another idea.
“(Nixa) called timeout and I went out there and said, ‘Guys, we’re going to have to punt here, we can’t go for it and risk it here,’” he said. “And our offensive line said ‘No, put it on us. Put it on us.’ Right then, man, I knew it was on.”
Senior quarterback Patrick Carlton followed his blockers for a 3-yard run and a new set of downs. Five plays later, Carlton hit Justin Sneed on a play-action pass for 40 yards, down to the 1-yard line, then punched it in for the score that loosened what had been a tight contest and vaulted Carthage to a 35-12 victory over the Nixa Eagles at David Haffner Stadium. The win capped an undefeated regular season for the Tigers at 8-0.
Nixa came into the matchup of COC championship contenders at 7-1, and looked ready to give Carthage a run for its money when the first play from scrimmage was an untouched Ramone Green dash to the end zone from 80 yards out. The Eagles, though, would go on to add only 271 more yards of offense, for a total of 351.
“These guys are a special group,” Guidie said. “We talked all week about ‘Yeah, this is a big game, but we’ve been in big games before. We’ve been there and we’ve done that.’ Champions are going to rise to the occasion, they’re going to overcome adversity. We came out, first play of the game they go 80 yards for a score and our kids didn’t flinch, and they very easily could have. They came right back and got after it. I love this group.”
Carthage flipped the script on a Nixa team that had, for the most part this season, dominated its opponents, allowing an average of only 11 points per game, while racking up more than 36 on offense. The Eagles scored only once more after Green’s long run, and Carlton and his offense pulled away with touchdowns on both of its final two drives.
Carlton totaled four touchdowns, and his usual backfield running mate, sophomore running back Luke Gall, added one for good measure. Carlton had 102 yards on 27 carries, while Gall added 18 attempts for 81 yards. Green finished with 147 rushing yards on 19 carries.
SCORING SUMMARY
CAR 7 14 0 14 — 35
NIX 6 0 6 0 — 12
FIRST QUARTER
NIX: Ramone Green 80-yard run. Kaleb James kick failed.
CAR: Patrick Carlton 2-yard run. Caleb Calvin kick.
SECOND QUARTER
CAR: Carlton 6 run. Calvin kick.
CAR: Carlton 1 run. Calvin kick.
THIRD QUARTER
NIX: Green 3 run. James kick failed.
FOURTH QUARTER
CAR: Carlton 1 run. Calvin kick.
CAR: Luke Gall 7 run. Calvin kick.
