Bradley's late rally just short

Bradley Central football coach Damon Floyd was frustrated his Bears waited until late in Friday's game against Bearden to get moving on offense. They lost 28-27, coming up short on a 2-point conversion attempt for the win in the game's final 20 seconds.
Bradley Central football coach Damon Floyd was frustrated his Bears waited until late in Friday's game against Bearden to get moving on offense. They lost 28-27, coming up short on a 2-point conversion attempt for the win in the game's final 20 seconds.

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Scores and Photos of Friday night high school football - Oct. 2

CLEVELAND, Tenn. - After three dismal quarters Friday night, the Bradley Central offense finally got rolling and scored on its final three drives.

Unfortunately for the Bears, their opponent got started sooner.

Bradley rallied from a 21-7 deficit, scoring with 17 seconds to play to trim Bearden's lead to 28-27, but the Bears' 2-point conversion attempt for the win came up short as the Bulldogs claimed the one-point victory at Bear Stadium in a Super 32 game.

"We came out after halftime, responded and started doing the things we wanted to do," Bearden coach Morgan Shinlever said. "We knew Bradley would put up points and put them up quick when they wanted to, but we executed the game plan.

"We were sloppy in doing it, but the important thing was we stayed with it and prevailed."

The two teams combined for 183 yards of offense in the first half and were tied at 7 at halftime. Bearden (4-3, 2-2) had accounted for only 62 of those yards, but more than doubled their yardage total on the second play of their first possession of the second half as quarterback Cameron Jones hooked up with a wide-open Skyler Hammett for a 79-yard score.

The Bulldogs moved downfield on the second possession, but a fumbled snap ended the march at the Bradley 1. However, Jones and Hammett hooked up again at the end of the third quarter, this time for an 11-yard score.

The Bears (4-2, 1-2), who gained half of their 320 yards of offense in the final three drives, rallied behind the arm and legs of quarterback Cole Copeland.

The highly-touted junior plunged the ball into the end zone from a yard out to cut the deficit to 21-14, then after Jones found Ty Chandler for a 21-yard touchdown to push the lead back to 14 points, Copeland led the Bears back downfield, hitting a wide-open Lameric Tucker for a score that made it 28-21 Bearden with 3:31 remaining.

After the Bears forced a punt, Copeland had two completions to Nick Howell and ran for 9 more yards before lofting a pass to 6-foot-4, 170-pound junior Trevon Hill, who outjumped a Bearden defender for the score.

Floyd immediately chose to go for two points, but Copeland was stopped a half-yard short of the end zone.

Jones threw for 192 of his 216 yards in the second half on just nine completions. Hammett had three catches for 111 yards.

Copeland finished with 174 yards passing and 79 rushing to lead the Bears. Howell had six catches for 96 yards.

"We waited until the last six minutes to play," Bradley coach Damon Floyd said. "If we played like we did the last seven minutes, maybe we win the game. But we got the ball to the 1-inch line and couldn't get in.

"If we can't do that, we don't deserve to win."

Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him at Twitter.com/genehenleytfp.

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