Bentonville rallies to nip Fayetteville 31-30 in OT

By Steve Andrews | Photo by Rally Miller  

BENTONVILLE – Quarterback Carter Nye was a little surprised when the coaches waved him back onto the field to go for the 2-point conversion in overtime Friday night. But the Bentonville junior calmly huddled the team back up to call the play, then went out and executed it to perfection, connecting with senior C.J. Brown just beyond the goal line.

The successful attempt gave the host Tigers an emotional 31-30 victory over longtime rival Fayetteville, thus tightening their grip on the 7A-West conference lead.

“I didn’t know we were going for it,” Nye said with a grin. “I was running off the field ,and they start pointing me back, so I was like, okay. My mind was shooting everywhere, but once the play happened it felt great.”

The Tigers had been down by 10 points early in the second half, before battling back to take a 23-20 lead on a 25-yard field goal by Braylon Hardrick with 3:37 remaining in the game. Fayetteville kicker Nathan Kachel, who had missed an extra point earlier in the game, then connected on his own 25-yard field goal to tie it at 23-23 with a minute left in regulation.

“I think that was just two really good football teams just battling it out, so it does not surprise me that we went into overtime,” Bentonville coach Jody Grant said. “Offensively, Fayetteville is dynamic, their quarterback is special, they’ve got some dangerous receivers and are just good at what they do.”

Bentonville (6-1, 4-0) took the game’s opening kickoff and quickly moved into Fayetteville territory. But a deflected pass off a Tiger receiver was picked off by Noah Janski at the Bulldog 24.

After the teams traded punts, Fayetteville (4-3, 2-2) finally generated an 11-play drive to put the first points on the board. Junior quarterback Drake Lindsey hit Jaison DeLamar on a 33-yard strike to make it 7-0 late in the first quarter.

Bentonville retaliated on the ensuing drive, as Nye connected with Brown on a 34-yard reception, then hit him again for a 29-yard touchdown to pull the Tigers even. Nye completed 17 of 29 passes for 277 yards in the game, while Brown hauled in five of those passes for 130 yards.

“Yeah, he’s always open,” Nye said of his favorite target. “I don’t think I’ve seen anyone run with him yet.”

Lindsey completed eight straight passes midway through the second quarter before throwing to running back Christian Setzer on a 11-yard outlet pass to put Fayetteville back in front, 14-7.

Lindsey, the state’s passing leader in Class 7A, completed 36-of-60 passes for 406 yards and three touchdowns.

Bentonville was able to cut it to 14-10 before the half on a 41-yard Hardrick field goal.

“We made a lot of mistakes early and that hurt us a little bit,” Grant said. “But we talked about that at halftime and challenged our guys to come out and be resilient, and they did that. I told them that we can sit here and let it keep happening or we can do something about it. So, every time we had a chance to get points, we took them.”

Lindsey hooked up with DeLamar for a 47-yard connection on the opening drive of the second half to get Fayetteville into Bentonville territory once again. Sophomore Landon Schaefer came in on a wildcat package and scurried in for a 12-yard score to boost the lead to 20-10.

“There was a lot of ups and downs, and we started out really slow with a bunch of miscues,” Nye said. “But we were able to flip it in the second half and start beating them on the one-on-ones, up front and outside, making plays.”

Flip it they did, scoring 13 unanswered points to take the lead.

Hardrick’s 32-yard field goal cut the lead to seven, then senior Josh Ficklin outran the entire Bulldog defense to the corner of the endzone for a 4-yard touchdown early in the fourth quarter to tie the score at 20-20. Ficklin, who came in averaging 130 yard per game, went for 126 on 28 carries. But one of his biggest contributions was in pass protection, giving Nye time to throw the ball down field on several plays.

After trading the late field goals, Fayetteville got the ball first in overtime. Lindsey hit junior Lach McKinney in the end zone on 3rd-and -10 to put the Bulldogs up 30-23.

McKinney finished with eight catches for 102 yards. Fellow junior Kaylon Morris led all Bulldogs receivers with nine catches for 145 yards.

Bentonville needed just one play in overtime for Fickling to again hit the edge for a 10-yard scamper to paydirt, thus setting the stage for the game-winning conversion.

And Grant had already made up his mind he was going for the win.

“I had already made the decision before the overtime session that if they kicked a field goal, we just needed to score a touchdown, but if they score and kick an extra point then we are just going to go ahead and try to win it,” he said. “Offensive they are effective, and it was tough for us to stop them.

“The beautiful thing now is that we control our own destiny and that’s what we have that others don’t. But the schedule doesn’t get any easier. We’ve still got really good football teams to play against, so we’ll just take it a week at a time and chip away.”

Dick was not surprised that the Tigers went for the win and admitted that he would have done the same thing.

“They had all the momentum at that point, they were at home, so we expected it,” he said. “The emotions were pretty high tonight, and I knew it would be, because of the caliber of both teams out there. Obviously, it’s not a good feeling to lose, but I’m proud of the way that our guys really fought all the way to the end.

“It was just a great football game between two teams that are obviously really well-coached. Our kids left it all out there, their kids left it all out there. We’ve just got to tip our hat to Bentonville.

And I’m sure we will probably see them again, because we’ve got a little history in the playoffs, too.”

Fayetteville will host Springdale in Razorback Stadium next Friday night, while Bentonville tries to keep rolling against Rogers, who along with Bentonville West, is just a game behind the Tigers in the conference standings.