Sep 11, 2008

Ava won a battle of the Bears at Willow Springs last Friday night to even their season mark at 1-1. The 16-12 win over the Willow Springs Bears placed Ava at 1-0 in conference play. The Bears will be home for the first time Friday night, facing the Houston Tigers which are 2-0 coming into the contest after going winless for two seasons. Ava showed some improvement after the 43-6 loss to Marshfield in the season opener, but still has people adjusting to new positions in the lineup. Junior Josh Wendler rushed for 115 yards Friday night in his new-found position in the Ava backfield, and Jake Plumb caught two touchdown passes in Ava's SCA victory. The Bears racked up a total of 252 yards of offense in the win. After a scoreless first quarter, Willow Springs took the lead early in the second period on a 1-yard run by quarterback Justin Johnson. The 2-point conversion attempt failed when a pass from Clint Harper was batted down by an Ava player. An excellent punt by Ava that rolled dead at the Willow Springs 13-yard line resulted in a safety at the 8-minute mark in the second quarter. On 2nd-and-10 at the 13, the Willow center snapped the ball over the head of the quarterback and Willow Springs recovered the ball in the end zone for an Ava safety. Willow then kicked to Ava from the 20, and the Bears began their first scoring drive of the game at the Willow Springs 45-yard line. At 2:52 in the second quarter, quarterback Tyler Williams passed to Plumb for a 4-yard pass play on 4th-and-goal, and Steven Barfield's kick put the Ava Bears on top, 9-6. Ava's defense forced Willow to punt on the ensuing drive, and the Bears moved the ball from their own 38 to the Willow Springs 12, but turned the ball back over to the home team there on downs. Ava actually covered enough ground on the drive to score, but a quarterback sack for a loss and a holding penalty stymied the visiting Bears. The Willow Bears took over at their own 12-yard line with 5 minutes left in the 3rd quarter and staged a sustained 88-yard drive to score with less than a minute remaining in the period. A combination of passes and runs by quarterback Johnson gave Willow a 1st-and-goal at the 5-yard line, and from there Johnson jogged in untouched for the score to put Willow Springs on top 12-9. The 2-point conversion pass attempt was intercepted by Ava. Ava put together an 80-yard drive of its own that resulted in the game winning touchdown that came at 10:01 in the fourth quarter. The series actually covered more than the 80 yards as the Bears overcame what could have been a costly penalty near the end zone. On 3rd-down-and-11 at the Willow Springs 15-yard line, Williams completed a pass to Plumb who stepped out of bounds one yard short of the goal line. But Ava was flagged for illegal use of the hands which resulted in a 15-yard penalty and loss of down, so instead of 1st-and-goal at the 1, the Bears had a 4th-and-26 at the 28. Not to be denied the go-ahead score, Williams again found Plumb in the end zone for a 28-yard touchdown pass. Barfield's kick sealed the game with the final score of 16-12. Ava's defense held tough in the final 10 minutes of the game, forcing Willow to punt the ball away once, then a Taylor Wallace interception with just over a minute left allowed Ava to run the clock out. Williams completed 10 of 20 passes for 91 yards and the two touchdowns. Plumb had five catches for 53 yards, Wallace 2 for 22 yards, Garrett Baird 2 for 10 yards, and Wendler 1 for 6 yards. In addition to Wendler's 24 carries for 115 yards, Williams rushed 10 times for 46 yards. Jeffery Tanner, Barfield and Kyle Daugherty were credited with nine tackles each to lead the Ava defense in that department. Pete Leonard had a loss-yardage tackle and Brian Sterling and Barfield each had a quarterback sack.