THE SOUTHWEST TIMES. PULASKI. VA.. SUNDAY. NOVEMBER 10,1991-PAGE A9

Cougars rally, win RVD title 24-2Hicks getswin No. 200BYDANCALLAHANSWT Sports Editor

ROANOKE-- Pulaski CountyHigh School staged a dramaticfourth quarter rally, comingfrom 14 points behind, to defeatPatrick Henry 24-21 and win the1991 Roanoke Valley Districtfootball championship outrightFriday in Roanoke's Victory Sta-dium. ;

The final margin of victory didnot come until senior BrianDuncan kicked a 31-yard fieldgoal with just four seconds left inthe game. , .

The Cougars will now head tolikely number one ranked Woodrbridge (10-0) to open the GroupAM, Division 6 Northwest Re-gion Playoffs Friday after finish-ing a perfect 4-0 in the RVD and8-2 overall on the season.

The victory, shocking in how ithappened, was also the 200thcareer triumph for head coachJoel Hicks.

"The kids just wouldn't quit,"said an extremely happy Hicksafter the game. "The middle twoquarters were really a problemtonight. We just weren't a sharpfootball team. We turned the ballover too much, and we justweren't playing with emotion,but the fourth quarter...hollycow, what an effort! For number200 to come like this makes it ;even more special," said Hicks.

He felt his team wasn't intothe game^ and after it scoredwith ease on the first possession,the edge was quickly gone. <

"We may have scored too easy.When you're really not up for agame, and then you get oneearly, the reaction isn't always . staff photo by Donntew.ib

Please see COUGARS, page A12 UP AND AWAY...Darden Freeman teed it up, and Brian Duncan drilled game winning 31-yard field goal as PH defender tried in vain to block it

N-E-V-E-R...N-E-V-E-R...N-E-V-E-R

ROANOKE-- The PulaskiCounty High School footballteam gathered in a joyous lockerroom in Victory Stadium aroundits head coach Joel Hicks. Thechant was one not heard before.

locker RoomDanCallahan

"Never...never...never.Never.. .never ...never.Never.. .never.. .never!"

The meaning is obvious.Under any condition, anywhere,anytime...never give up.

Pulaski County didn't give upFriday and overcame a 14-pointfourth quarter deficit to defeatPatrick Henry, 24-21. The finalmargin of victory came on a31-yard field goal by Brian Dun-can that split the heart of thecrossbar with just four ticks lefton the clock. .

With less than seven minutes

to play, the Cougars were down21-7, but this team has comefrom behind so often this seasonone had to expect that somethingwas left to happen, yet thingsseemed a little more dismal thenusual because there appeared tobe a1 flatness to the game, PCHSwas having turnover problems,and having trouble stopping PH,even a simple quarterbacksneak.

But the good drive came in thefourth. The defense picked upthe intensity. Two breaks pre-sented themselves. Pulaski Co.took advantage of both. PHfound a way to lose. Pulaski Co.found a way to win.

This game was the perfect ex-ample that everything that de- Itermines a football game is notjust simple size, speed, and such.Sometimes teams win because ofthings you can't see...jnsidestuff. This Cougar team ob-viously has the right

Please see CALLAH AN, page A12 Halfback Carl Lewis finds the hole and scores tieing touchdown in fourth quarter

Staff photo by Donnle Wall*

Blundin's found the groove. Virginia routs N.C. State, 42-10RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) Matt Blundin says he's

settled into a comfort zone. Some groove!Blundin continued his season of perfection Sat-

urday, hitting Larry Holmes with two first-halfscoring passes as No. 24 Virginia pounded No. 18North Carolina State 42-10 in the Atlantic CoastConference. t

The Cavaliers (7-2-1 overall and 4-2-1 in theACC) beat the Wolfpack (7-2, 3-2) for the-sixthstraight time and knocked them out of the ACC ti-tle chase.

Blundin, who entered the game with 184 at-tempts without an interception, completed eight of10 passes for 192 yards and no interceptions in theopening half. Virginia took a 35-3 lead at intermis-sion with 320 yards of total o Tense. '

"A lot of it has to do with comfort and getting the ,experience of getting out there and being relaxed,"

said Blundin, who, backed up Shawn Moore thelast two seasons. "I know where ray guys are.".

Blundin, who has completed 60 percent of hispasses,.ended the day 13 of 17 for 230 yards. The6-foot-7 quarterback is 14 attempts short of JackTrudeau's NCAA mark of 215 straight attemptswithout an interception set at Illinois in 1985. .

"It's probably the best half I've played all year,"Blundin said. "I felt good about it. I was on themoney."

George Welsh, who has coached several NFLquarteracks in his stint at Virginia, said Blundinis playing as well as any of them.

"He is playing about as well as he can play,"Welsh said."Maybe he has one game left then hecan throw some interceptions for the ChicagoBears or somebody."

Welsh also credited his offensive line for not al-

lowing a sack.While Blundin was.picking apart the nationally

.ranked Wolfpack defense and the rushing gamewas churning out big gains in the opening half, theCavalier defense turned back two early Wolfpackscoring opportunities after turnovers to roll to vic-tory, ' : "

. Virginia tailback Terry Kirby fumbled on the se-cond play from scrimmage at his own 38, but theWolfpack was stopped on downs and forced topunt. . . ' " ' , '

Virginia struck quickly on its next series as itdid on four of its five scoring drives in the first half.Four of the Cavalier touchdowns came on drives ofless than two minutes.

Blundin's 91-yard completion to Tyrone Davisset up Kirby's 1-yard plunge with 10:54 left in thefirst period. The pass play was the fourth longest

in Virginia history,"It mainly hurt on the Scoreboard," Wolfpack

coach Dick Sheridan said of the long pass play."One play shouldn't get the defense or the teamdown. Sure, it hurt. Even if you take that out, theywere still the better football team."

Keith Lyle's interception two plays later helpedset up Nikki Fisher's 11-yard scoring run before ashocked and soaked Wolfpack crowd and rep-resentatives from seven bowl games.

"I was surprised we got 35 points in the first half... considering how well their defense has been inthe past and this year," Blundin said. "We had thatnervousness coming in at halftime. I was nervousthe whole first half thinking they were going to ex-plode any minute because that's the type of teamthey are." .

PAGE Al 2-THE SOUTHWEST TIMES, PULASKI, VA.( SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 10,1991

CougarsContinued from page A9

what you would like it to be. Ifelt l ike we could have jumped'oilPIT again, and this would, havebceii Fairly .easy, but we didn'tbecause of the turnovers.

"I also want to credit PH. Ithought they played hard, andreally wanted to beat PulaskiCo. They prepared well for us,"said Hicks. . . . ' ' : '

The coach also might haveadded that it normally takesfour quarters to beat the Cou-gars. PI1 came up one quarter

.: short."Things got tough," said senior'

wingback-linebacker Ricky Huff;"The game wasn't going our way,but we didn't quit. Pulaski Co.doesn't quit." .

Stat SheetPC 7 0 0 17: 24PH'. Q 6 15 0 21

PCHousel 6 yd. run, Duncnn PAT7:401st : . ' . . ' . ' . ' ' 'PHMarshall 42 yd. interception,PAT failed 9:34 2nd :PHNoel 2 yd. run, Tt\ylor pass toMarshall 2 pt. PAT 7:57 3rdPHTaylor 65 yd. run, Nugue PAT4:433rd ;PCHousel 3 yd. run, Duncan PA'T6:15 4thPCLewis 1 yd. run, Duncan , PAT1:54 4thPCDuncan 31 yd. FG, 0:04 4th

' PC PH1st Down 17 13Rushing 54-292 38-289Passing 3-7-1 . 3-124Passing yds. 24 26Total Offense 316 315Punting 3-32.0 3-29.0,Fumbles 4-2 4-2Penalties 4-39 3-19Return Yds. 52 19

RushingPCHousel 18-94, Huff 11-85, Yates14-59, Lewis 8-54, Webb 1-4, Burrus 2-minusS.PH-/Tnylor 11-135, Reynplds 15-87:Noel 11-71, Johnson 1- minus 4.PassingPCBurrus 3-7-1 24 yds.PHTaylor 2-10-1 15 yds., Johnson1-2-011 yds. ;ReiieivingPCHousel 1-13, Hunter 2-11PHWilliams 245, Burch 1-11.

Tight end-linebacker JohnAkers was a content senior fol-lowing the game. "This feels so good. I didn't liketo have to win that way. I'drather have jumped to a two-touchdown lead and moved onout. This was scary...but excit-ing," he smiled.

As for his "head coach, Akerssaid the team new about "200."

"We talked a little about it.Everybody thought about the200. We wanted this to be theteam to give coach Hicks his200th win. People didn't thinkwe'd get much done. Peopledidn't even know if we'd win four

.games, but the coaches, went towork with us. Coach Hickschanged the, offense to help us,arid did some other things he

'thought would help us, thingsthat he usually doesn't do. We

.just .sort of felt like if he was go-ing to work so hard, and change

^ things to try and help us, wewanted to get this game for him.I'm proud that we did," saidAkers.

The game started like it wouldbe a stroll to the* outright title.Even a 15-yard penalty didn'tbother the Cougars on the way toa nine-play game opening drivethat ended when halfback J.J..Housel swept over from six yardsout. Brian Duncan kicked theconversion for a 7-0 Pulaski Co.lead.

The next two possessions en-ded with a fumble and punt for

. the Cougars.. PH was seeminglymuddling around with not muchhappening.

Then suddenly a first downBrad Burrus pass to the; rightflat was picked off and returned42 yards to the end zone by PH'sDavid Marshall. Still, .AlbertNugiie missed the conversionkick, and PCHS remained outfront 7-6. :

The ball keep moving fairlywell too, but another fumble anda holding penalty ruined thenext two possessions. PulaskiCo. had over 180 yards of totaloffense the first half, and ninefirst downs, but just the '7' to

. . . Staff phblo by Donnl Walls

(L-R); Brad Burrus,