MARTINSBURG, W.Va — With the cold, wind and Morgantown Mohigans in its way, none of the three was enough to stop Spring Mills from reaching the high school football semifinals for the first time in school history on Friday.
The Cardinals got two rushing touchdowns from quarterback Max Anderson and stopped a Morgantown drive inside their own 30-yard line with under 1 minute to play on the way to a 14-7 victory Friday afternoon at SMHS.
“I knew coming into the game it was going to be a low-scoring defensive game,” Spring Mills head coach Marcus Law said, “With the way our defense has been playing, I had no problem with that. Offensively, we had to do our part to make sure we were put in a good position.”
Following a scoreless first quarter plagued by loose ball security and low temperatures, Anderson scampered across the goal line just 46 seconds into the second stanza to open the scoring.
With freshman quarterback Maddox Twigg leading the way, Morgantown marched down the field on the ensuing drive and traveled inside the Cardinals red zone for the first time.
Closing in on paydirt, 1,000-yard rusher AJ Thomas was wrapped up and pulled down for a loss. Thomas was slow to get up after the play and did not return.
That did not spell trouble on the drive, however, as Twigg carried the ball inside the 5-yard line, fumbled into the end zone and then recovered his fumble for the Mohigans’ first and only score.
A series of fumbles, due in large part to the frigid conditions, left the game scoreless for the remainder of the half and into the third quarter before the Cardinal rushing attack managed an extended march into Morgantown territory.
Anderson added his second scoring tote of the day to reclaim the lead on a day that he handled 14 carries for 95 yards and the pair of scores.
Spring Mills got the job done.
The Cardinals held off Morgantown for a 14-7 win and a spot in the Class AAAA semifinals next week.
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“Max is a warrior. He’s the face for us and he’s been doing it all his career. He put it down and he went and took the thing home for us,” Law said.
Later in the fourth, the Mohigans were able to stop Anderson on third down and force a turnover on downs following an incompletion inside Morgantown territory to earn a chance for a potential game-tying drive.
With Twigg leading the visitors inside the Spring Mills 20, a penalty forced Morgantown into a second down and 20 situation at the 27-yard line.
After a short completion and a sack, the vaunted Cardinal pass rush forced the freshman out of the pocket where he was sacked by Bradley Butts to force a game-sealing turnover on downs.
It was the last of ten negative plays forced by the Spring Mills defense.
“The senior class, they weren’t going to go out without putting everything on the line and that’s what they did and that’s across the line with Prophet (Guillaume) and Xavier (Anderson) and Abel (Meza) who even had a knicked up hand,” Law said, “He was refusing to come out and he was going to put in that work inside. Coach (Buddy) Hesen put it on point, we give them the opportunity to win the game and they were going to come through.”
Blake Sanders helped out the Cardinal offense with 93 rushing yards on 17 carries while Twigg led the Mohigan attack with 23 carries to total 71 yards on the ground.
Spring Mills continues its historic season, reaching the 11-win plateau for the first time and now awaits the winner of Jefferson and Hurricane in its first semifinal appearance in school history.