The Long County Blue Tide football team hit the road on Friday, November 6 still looking for their first win of the season after a disheartening homecoming loss to Brantley County the week before.
With injuries, the team knew their game against the Pierce County Bears, one of the top teams in classification AAA, was going to be a tough one from the start.
The Bears quickly took the lead on the Tide as their defense made a big play just two plays in. A toss out to running back Ahmari Douglas was just out of his reach as the Bears scooped and seemingly scored.
However, the defender stepped out of bounds just yards before the goal line.
Two plays later, the Bears got into the endzone on a jet sweep run. They went up 7-0 after the extra point.
The Tide offense went back out to the field and could not get much going on their end as they went three-and-out again and punted.
Chris Garcia’s punt was caught by the wind and traveled about 20 yards before the Bears took over at the Tide 45.
The Tide defense made a big play on their next series as they forced a fourth and short from the 30. They made a play on the ball and got the ball back on downs, giving the offense the ball there.
However, the Bears defense held strong again, forcing a punt. This time, Garcia’s punt was blocked and picked up by the Bears and ran back for the touchdown, making the score 14-0 early.
The Tide were forced to punt once again and Garcia’s punt got knocked down out of the air and ended up traveling officially only one yard as the Bears took over at the Tide 18.
The Bears ended up leading the Tide 28-0 at the end of the first quarter and added 21 points in the second quarter to go up 49-0 at the half.
With a running clock the entire second half, the Tide did not allow but three points in the second half.
The Bears went on to a 52-0 win over the Blue Tide, dropping Long County to 0-9 on the year.
The Tide will now play the final regular season game of the season on November 20 as they will host Tattnall County. The Tide must win this game to force a three-game mini playoff between them, Tattnall and Brantley County on Monday, November 23 to determine the bottom two seeds from Region 1-AAA for the state playoffs.
A loss for the Tide would drop them out of the state playoffs.