Cougars advance to state title after late score
MOUNTAIN BROOK – In a slugfest of strength against strength, the vaunted Mountain Brook High School defense held up as long as it could against the electrifying Clay-Chalkville offense.
But Clay-Chalkville’s offense had the final say, going 80 yards in two plays in the final moments to score the game-winning touchdown in a 24-18 win over Mountain Brook on Friday night in the Class 6A semifinals at Spartan Stadium.
After Clay took the lead early in the fourth quarter, Mountain Brook went on a grinding, time-consuming march down the field. The Spartans earned four first downs on a drive that took 16 plays and nearly eight minutes off the clock, but settled for a 27-yard Reed Harradine field goal to tie the game at 18-18.
With 1:48 to play, it looked as if the Cougars may be headed to overtime for the second straight week. But from his own 20-yard line, Clay-Chalkville quarterback Khalib Johnson swung the ball out to his sophomore receiver Mario Craver, who did the rest. He shook a few defenders, left a few others in the dust and bolted 64 yards into the red zone.
“I knew I had to make a play,” Craver said. “Our offense was very confident, and we knew we had to make a play. Someone had to step up, and it just happened to be me.”
On the very next play, running back Edward Osley powered his way through the initial contact near the line of scrimmage and sprung free for a 16-yard score to give the Cougars a 24-18 lead. It was his third score of the night and capped off a dominant performance. He rushed 20 times for 141 yards in a standout showing.
The Clay-Chalkville (14-0) defense held Mountain Brook at bay on its final gasp, lifting the Cougars to its first state championship appearance since 2015.
Clay-Chalkville will face Hueytown, which beat Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa on Friday night, next Friday, Dec. 3, at 7 p.m. at Birmingham’s Protective Stadium.
“I love this team. We never give up,” said Johnson, who finished 12-of-15 passing for 167 yards.
Coming into the game, Clay-Chalkville’s offense and Mountain Brook’s defense were two of the most dominant units across the state. For much of the evening, the Spartans defense made the Cougars earn everything they got. Clay-Chalkville scored on its opening possession thanks to good field position after a Mountain Brook turnover, but that was all the offense mustered in the first half.
The second half proved a different story. Mountain Brook’s offense was unable to sustain much in the third quarter to keep the defense off the field and the Cougars began to make some headway. Johnson hit Mbakwe on a 22-yard scoring pass to open up the third quarter and cut the Clay deficit to 15-12.
After the teams exchanged consecutive punts, Clay bridged the third and fourth quarters with a long drive that culminated in Osley’s 45-yard touchdown, his second of three scores on the night.
The dam finally broke when the Cougars got the ball back with less than two minutes to play.
“They do such a great job tackling in space and taking away certain things,” Clay-Chalkville head coach Drew Gilmer said of the Spartans defense. “We can’t get discouraged, we have to keep getting the ball to them and eventually they’ll make a play.”
Mountain Brook (12-2) shut the opposition out in half of its games this season, allowing a meager 3.8 points in its 12 victories. Defensive coordinator Robert Evans received high praise throughout the season for the way his unit performed.
“The great thing about our defense is if you look at the stats, we’ve got some really good players over there, but the thing is they play so well together. They play in a pack, in a swarm and play team defense, and that’s what great defenses do,” Mountain Brook head coach Chris Yeager said.
Mountain Brook started the game well, pulling out all the stops against the top-ranked Cougars. The Spartans benefited from a muffed punt that gave them the ball at the 22-yard line. A few plays later, they faked a field goal and receiver Jake Thompson floated a pass that somehow landed in George Cain’s arms for an 18-yard touchdown, despite him being surrounded by multiple Clay defenders.
The Spartans took an 8-6 lead after Cole Gamble ran it in on the two-point try.
In the second quarter, Mountain Brook turned Clay over on downs, then Jones Beavers intercepted Johnson on the next possession. That set up John Colvin’s 16-yard touchdown strike to Sims Brown, giving the Spartans a 15-6 lead at the break.
But Mountain Brook’s offense was unable to sustain that momentum in the second half. Outside of the game-tying field goal, the Spartans punted twice and fumbled on another possession.
“I felt like tonight we had mistakes, turnovers, penalties and we left our defense on the field too long tonight and it caught up with us at the end. The kids played their guts out tonight,” Yeager said.
Colvin finished the night 10-of-19 for 91 yards. Cain caught four balls for 47 yards and Brown caught two passes for 27 yards. The Spartans ran the ball effectively as well, with Gamble and Will Waldrop going for 72 and 56 rushing yards, respectively.
Clay’s win avenged last season’s loss to Mountain Brook in the quarterfinals. Clay-Chalkville is making its first appearance in the state championship since 2015, when the Cougars fell to Spanish Fort, snapping a 29-game winning streak and ending a berth for a second straight state title.
After blowing out most of their opponents all season, the Cougars have prevailed in thrilling contests each of the last two weeks, after last week’s 50-44 overtime win over Gardendale.
“They responded great. We saw that last week, too. This is a team that loves playing with each other. They like playing the game. They love each other, they play hard and I’m very happy for these guys,” Gilmer said.
Yeager paused for a moment before giving a final word on his 2021 Spartans team, one that will certainly go down as one of the school’s best in recent memory.
“We lost 46 seniors and we were ranked eighth when the season started,” he said. “The thing that’s special is when a team reaches its potential and this team maximized its potential. To see them grow the way they grew all year, was so gratifying.”