POTOMAC- “Let them score! Let them score! Let them score!”
Those were the words that Bullis head coach Pat Cilento feverishly relayed to his defense with 1 minute and 45 seconds remaining. Oddly enough, it was the most logical decision. And for numerous of reasons.
Woodberry Forest’s offense had already generated a whopping 52 points on the fatigued Bullis defense and they were on the doorstep once more – awaiting a first and goal on the eight yard line.
Time was ticking and a decision needed to be made, being down one point. Cilento had no choice – ordering his defense to back off and let up a quick score to get the ball back into his prized quarterbacks hands of Dwayne Haskins. Woodberry Forest trotted across the pylon to stretch their lead to eight points.
Cilento got what he wanted and it was up to the Bullis offense to come through. Before the kickoff, Haskins, the senior general, gathered up his bunch to create a vision within the huddle – almost like painting a picturesque image, knowing how to get from point A to point B and from point B to crossing the finish line.
“I told them to let me lead,” Haskins said. “Just get behind me and we will get this thing done.”
With their backs against the wall and having no timeouts to spare, Haskins and the Bullis offense set up shop for one final time, at their own 29 yard line with one minute and 31 seconds remaining. Just like he said, Haskins started to move the ball down the field – from the 29, to the 46, then crossing into enemy territory to the 42 yard line.
The suspense was building and fans rose from their seats. There was now 20.5 seconds left and Haskins faced a third and ten. He took the snap, dropped back and scanned the field only to find none of his Bulldog receivers with any separation from defenders. The blitz was coming, Haskins stood firmly in the pocket – shaking left and busting a move to the right side to buy more time.
That’s when he heaved the pigskin downfield and connected with fellow senior Zach Hawkins that put Bullis at the two yard line and ignited the Bulldog faithful. Two plays later, Haskins found Damani Neal on the run in which he crossed the left corner of the end zone a mere seconds away from the end of regulation buzzer.
Then, they converted on the two point conversion on an Andres Lopez run and just like that the game was knotted at 59-59. The game then went into overtime. Bullis scored on their first offensive possession, but the mishandled snap by Damani Neal on the two point conversation was costly as Woodberry Forest came back, scored and converted the PAT to upend Bullis, 66-65.
“With a guy like Dwayne (Haskins) back there, he’s always going to be there making plays,” Cilento said. “Our defense couldn’t get a stop to save our lives tonight, but (Woodberry Forest) is a good football team.”
“Dwayne is an artist,” junior running back Andres Lopez said, who finished with 113 yards on 16 carries. “He knows where to put everything. He knows what to do. He is the general of our offense.”
Haskins showed why he’s one of the top quarterback prospects in the nation, engineering a ten play, 71 yard drive in under a one minute and 30 second timespan to lift his Bulldogs out of danger at the time being.
“Drives like those, that’s a quarterbacks dream,” Haskins said, who completed 29 of 44 passes for 442 yards and seven touchdowns. He also picked up 63 yards and one touchdown on the ground in his 13 carries. “But, we took the loss tonight and no one on this team plays individually. It was out there, it was out there.”
The senior quarterback was a workhorse for the Bulldogs all night, just trying to keep up with the high powered Woodberry Forest offensive unit that racked up 482 yards of total offense. And that in itself was hard to do, even for the number two ranked quarterback in the nation by ESPN.com.
The Tigers scored on every single offensive possession for the entire game, from start to finish.
Yes, you read that correctly. Not a single punt occurred.
It was a game that was virtually 11 on zero as both defenses were nonexistent – allowing a combined 17 touchdowns for the course of the game.
“It was just crazy,” Haskins said. “Probably one of the most craziest game I’ve ever been apart of.”
Bullis (0-2) hopes to gain some momentum next week as they play Avalon.
“We played our tails off tonight and still came short,” Lopez said.
“We got better today,” Haskins said. “And we’ll continue to put in the necessary work to get to where we need to be.”
Bullis’ Damani Neal recorded 15 receptions for 163 yards and four touchdowns.
You can follow me on Twitter at @k_fadd and Maryland Sports Access at @MDSportsAccess.
Box score
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | OT | Final | |
| BUL | 10 | 21 | 6 | 22 | 6 | 65 |
| WF | 10 | 21 | 14 | 14 | 7 | 66 |
Scoring summary
| B | WF | ||||
| 1st | 8:44 | BUL | Noah Nwosu 29 yard field goal | 3 | 0 |
| 6:20 | WF | Thomas Radke 14 yard pass from Lindell Stone (Alexander kick) | 3 | 7 | |
| 4:43 | WF | Wyatt Alexander 29 yard field goal | 3 | 10 | |
| 1:06 | BUL | Jalen Hill 36 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (Nwosu kick) | 10 | 10 | |
| 2nd | 10:58 | WF | Zach Roderick 7 yard pass from Lindell Stone (Alexander kick) | 10 | 17 |
| 8:38 | BUL | Zach Hawkins 21 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (Kick no good) | 16 | 17 | |
| 8:28 | WF | Terrell Jana 66 yard pass from Lindell Stone (Alexander kick) | 16 | 24 | |
| 6:22 | BUL | Damani Neal 13 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (2 pt conv good) | 24 | 24 | |
| 3:10 | WF | Zach Roderick 9 yard pass from Lindell Stone (Alexander kick) | 24 | 31 | |
| 0:13 | BUL | Dwayne Haskins Jr. 5 yard run (Nwosu kick) | 31 | 31 | |
| 3rd | 9:53 | WF | Terrell Jana 24 yard pass from Lindell Stone (Alexander kick) | 31 | 38 |
| 5:39 | BUL | Andres Lopez 9 yard run (Kick no good) | 37 | 38 | |
| 2:26 | WF | Evans Riviere 3 yard run (Alexander kick) | 37 | 45 | |
| 4th | 10:07 | BUL | Damani Neal 2 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (2 pt conv no good) | 43 | 45 |
| 7:21 | WF | Evans Riviere 3 yard run (Alexander kick) | 43 | 52 | |
| 5:26 | BUL | Damani Neal 11 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (2 pt conv good) | 51 | 52 | |
| 1:37 | WF | D’Angelo Davis 9 yard run (Alexander kick) | 51 | 59 | |
| 0:05 | BUL | Damani Neal 1 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (2 pt conv good) | 59 | 59 | |
| OT | BUL | Andres Lopez 10 yard pass from Dwayne Haskins Jr. (2 pt conv no good) | 65 | 59 | |
| WF | Evans Riviere 5 yard run (Alexander kick) | 65 | 66 |
Individual statistics – Bullis
| Passing | Comp | Att | Yards | Comp% | TD | INT | QBR |
| #7 Dwayne Haskins, Jr. | 29 | 44 | 442 | 65.90% | 7 | 1 | 128.9 |
| Rushing | Att | Yards | Avg | TD | Fum |
| #8 Andres Lopez | 16 | 113 | 7.1 | 1 | 0 |
| #7 Dwayne Haskins, Jr. | 12 | 63 | 5.3 | 1 | 0 |
| #17 Olandis Gary | 3 | 5 | 1.7 | 0 | 0 |
| #16 Tucker Strachen | 1 | -12 | -12.0 | 0 | 0 |
| Receiving | Rec | Yards | Avg | TD | Fum |
| #4 Damani Neal | 15 | 163 | 10.9 | 4 | 0 |
| #81 Jalen Hill | 5 | 123 | 24.6 | 1 | 0 |
| #8 Andres Lopez | 3 | 56 | 18.7 | 1 | 0 |
| #5 Cameron Brown | 3 | 31 | 10.3 | 0 | 0 |
| #21 Zach Hawkins | 2 | 62 | 31.0 | 1 | 0 |
| #6 Langston Stephens | 1 | 7 | 7.0 | 0 | 0 |
Individual statistics – Woodberry Forest
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