Spartans rally past Pinson Valley in 2nd half

MOUNTAIN BROOK – Pinson Valley gave Mountain Brook a shoulder to pry on.

With momentum back in its favor after a Stuart Andrews 9-yard touchdown run and a 23-yard field goal off the cleat of Anderson Roberts, Mountain Brook High School took a 26-18 lead late in the third quarter against the Indians. On the ensuing kickoff, the ball rolled up Demarcus Waldrop’s shoulder pad, onto his back, and, quite frankly, he could not get it off. Miller Crumpton stripped it away for the Spartans and Andrews scored on a 4-yard run three plays later, Hayes Windle scored on a pick-six nine seconds later, and Mountain Brook ran away with a 47-30 Class 6A, Region 6 win over visiting Pinson Valley at Spartan Stadium on Thursday.

“They’re a good football team,” Mountain Brook head coach Chris Yeager said of Pinson Valley. “They’ve played some unbelievable competition, and they’ve competed in every game. They competed tonight. They took the fight to us.”  

With Mountain Brook up 40-18 after Windle’s pick-six, Pinson Valley (1-6, 1-3 in region) didn’t wilt. Quarterback Derrico Freeman called his own number and raced 86 yards to cut the deficit to 40-24 with 6:20 to play. Andrews’ fourth rushing touchdown of the game, this one from 38 yards, put the Spartans (5-3, 2-2) up 47-24. The Indians again didn’t quit, and scored again with two minutes to play when Jamison Green connected with Waldrop for a 14-yard touchdown.

“We’ve got a young team just like they’ve got a young team,” Yeager said. “We’ve got to learn how to do things. A young team has to learn how to do things. You don’t just approach the game of football with a casual approach to get ready for the games. You can play other sports; you can play baseball or you can play basketball and you’re playing two or three games a week. This one, we’ve got one time, and the reason is it takes so much to get over the last game physically and emotionally, and it comes around once a week. It takes seven days to get ready for it, and you’ve got to be very intentional about getting ready for this game. I’m not sure how intentional we were. I think we played really hard in some spots, but we didn’t play four quarters of Mountain Brook football.”

The game proved uncharacteristic of Mountain Brook from the opening kickoff. Floyd Calhoun returned it 95 yards for a Pinson Valley touchdown. The two-point try failed. Mountain Brook took a 7-6 lead when quarterback Cayden Hofbauer hit Sam Smith for a 39-yard score. The Indians responded, however, going 66 yards in 14 plays, capped by Freeman’s 2-yard scoring run to go up 12-7.

Roberts kicked a 21-yard field goal to cut the deficit to 12-10 but Waldrop returned the ensuing kickoff 83 yards for a touchdown.

“I’ve never been on a team where the opponent returned two kickoffs in a game,” Yeager said. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that. We’ve got a lot of work to do in that area.”

Andrews rushed for a 1-yard touchdown just before halftime to cut Mountain Brook’s deficit to 18-16.

For Mountain Brook, Andrews finished with 33 carries for 196 yards and four touchdowns. Hofbauer completed 9-of-17 passes for 156 yards, one touchdown and one interception. Smith led the receivers with 64 yards and a touchdown on three receptions. John Colvin also had three grabs for 61 yards.

Defensively, the Spartans got interceptions from Bo Currie, Windle, and Cannon Mussafer. Crumpton recovered a fumble.

For Pinson Valley, Freeman finished 5-of-16 passing for 99 yards and three interceptions. He rushed, however, for 140 yards and two touchdowns on 15 carries. Calhoun, in addition to his 95-yard kickoff return score, rushed 17 times for 69 yards. Christian Thomas led the Indians with four receptions for 90 yards. Kaden Edwards notched an interception for the Pinson Valley defense.

Pinson Valley hosts Pell City next Friday, while Mountain Brook travels to Huffman, as both teams remain in region play.

“If we don’t get the message tonight that it’s not about our opponent, it’s about us … we told them that at the beginning of the week, it’s not about who you played last week, it’s not about all the external things you can’t control, the only thing is your preparation and what’s your standard,” Yeager said. “If you’ve got a standard of excellence, then you should have an excellent standard of preparation.”

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