By Steve Carter
DOUGLAS — Maybe it was too much to ask.
Tift County Blue Devils head football coach Jay Walls was trying for his 13th win as Tift head coach on the most inopportune of days, Friday the 13th.
Instead of going 13-4 at Tift, Walls went to 12-5 as the top-ranked Devils fell 23-20 to the Coffee High Trojans, ranked 8th in the state Class AAAAA Associated Press poll, here Friday night at Jardine Stadium.
The loss drops Tift to 5-1 on the year, while Coffee goes to 6-1. More importantly, the Devils are 1-1 in Region 1-AAAAA, while the Trojans go to 2-1.
Warner Robins is now 3-0 overall in the league after a 21-17 win over Valdosta, while Houston County is 2-1, after a 25-14 win over Colquitt County. Valdosta is now 0-3 in the region, while Colquitt is 1-2.
Walls said after the loss, “We missed a lot of opportunties, but Coffee is a good football team, and they were a big reason we missed those chances.”
Tift never led in the game as Coffee jumped out quick with three field goals by Will Goggans.
The last Goggans kick was a 47-yard field goal with 34 seconds left in the first half.
Besides kicking the field goals all of Goggans’ kickoffs went into the end zone for touchbacks.
However after the last field goal Goggans’ kickoff went to the nine. Tift’s Blake Reddick returned the kickoff 91 yards for a touchdown. Charlie Edwards kicked the point after, and the score was 9-7 at the half.
Coffee quickly got back its nine-point lead when the Trojans took the opening second-half kickoff and went six plays and 80 yards for a touchdown. The score came on a Mark Wilson 3-yard run. Goggans’ point after made the score 16-7 with 10:27 left.
Two Coffee fumbles led to a pair of Charlie Edwards field goals, one of 30 yards and one of 44. The last came with 38.8 seconds left in the third quarter.
Tift apparently had a touchdown on a Chaney-to-Worth Ellis 31-yard pass before the last Edwards field goal. However that touchdown was negated by a ineligible man down the field.
Coffee quickly came back down and scored on a two-play, 67-yard drive after the Tift kickoff. The score came on a 21-yard run by Rod Jones. Goggans kicked the point after and the score was 23-13 with 14.2 seconds left in the third.
The scoring ended when Sean Baxley hit Ellis on a 38-yard touchdown pass with 4:34 left in the game. Edwards point after made the score 23-20.
Tift had one last chance with 2:00 left as they took over the ball on their own three after a punt. However, Baxley was intercepted by Rashad McCray and that ended the game.
“I was proud of the kids for their effort,” Walls said. “But we did not play as well as we were capable. Again you have to hand it to Coffee, because they played a big part in that.”
Coffee quarterback Daniel Anderson led the Trojan offense as he went 12-for-17 for 206 yards. Coffee had 359 yards of total offense. The rushing offense was led by Melvin Loving who had 10 carries for 64 yards.
Kaream Hess led Tift’s offense with six catches for 51 yards. Ellis had three catches for 56 yards. Baxley was 16-for-24 passing for 153 yards. The Coffee defense held the Devils to -15 yards rushing on 19 carries. That gave Tift 138 yards of total offense.
The Devils will be back in action quickly as Tift will travel to Houston County to face the Bears on Thursday. That game will be at 7:30 p.m.
