Don’t ever count them out.
South Shore’s football team staged yet another improbable win on Nov. 4, rallying in the final two minutes of play and taking advantage of a big-time Midwood turnover to notch a 24–20 victory over the Hornets at Aviator Sports Complex.
“We got very lucky, about as lucky as you can get,” said Vikings coach Matt Ciquera. “It feels great to be 7–2. I just wish we would have played better.”
The Hornets (6–3) were just a minute-and-a-half away from notching a 20–16 victory in the final game of the regular season — needing to run just one more play before the squad could kneel out the rest of the clock — but a bad snap sailed over Midwood quarterback Tyshawn Young’s head. South Shore recovered the ball at the Hornets’ five-yard line, and there was only one player the Vikings wanted with the ball in his hands — senior quarterback Jason Martin.
Martin gave South Shore the lead with 1:41 left on the clock — barrelling into the end zone from one yard out and leaving Midwood stunned on the sidelines.
“When we got the ball back, I knew what time it was,” said Martin, who finished with 369 all-purpose yards. “I told the coaches, ‘Just give me the ball and let me get this one for my team.’ ”
Martin didn’t just want to score the touchdown to lead his squad to victory, he wanted to make amends for some early-game miscues that made it all but impossible for South Shore to find its footing.
The senior quarterback fumbled at the five-yard line on the Vikings’ first drive of the game and threw a pair of first-half interceptions, including a 100-yard pick-six by Dontae McGriff late in the second quarter. Martin’s go-ahead touchdown helped erase some of the frustration he felt over the mistakes.
“A lot of the stuff was bad reads, and I’ll take the blame for the first half,” Martin said. “We gave up four turnovers, and we were still in the game. It was just about staying focused and trying to do what we could, because we’re so used to games like this.”
Midwood, however, was not about to go down without a fight, and the squad almost staged its own late-game comeback after Martin’s touchdown. The Hornets marched down the field on the ensuing drive, sparked by Young under center, and had two shots at the end zone from the 26-yard line with seconds left on the clock.
South Shore safety Barrington Clarke broke up the first attempt, and the final shot was dropped in the end zone as Vikings defenders swarmed towards the ball.
“The corner got beat, and I tried to help my brother out and go for the ball,” Clarke said of his defensive stop. “We knew our defense was doing a pretty good job of stopping them all game. We tried to just contain them.”
It wasn’t pretty, and it was yet another dramatic late-game finish, but it was a victory — one that earned the Vikings a first-round postseason bye. South Shore’s season has been chock-full of games like this, and the squad is hoping its collective heart palpitations throughout the fall have prepared the Vikings for a deep playoff run.
Last year, we didn’t really have any of this,” Ciquera said. “We ended up losing in the first round of the playoffs, so hopefully being more battle-tested will help us moving forward.”