CALEDONIA — A somber feeling instantly hit the Caledonia defensive players on the field. It soon trickled over to the home sideline.
In a tightly-contested, back-and-forth affair, Caledonia (1-3) couldn’t make one final stop in overtime to prevent Shannon (3-2) from leaving town with a 34-28 overtime victory Friday in its MHSAA Class 4A, Region 2 opener.
Before the final touchdown, frustrations were already mounting after a Caledonia touchdown was called back due to a holding penalty on its opening offensive series in overtime, resulting in the team failing to score.
Then, even though the defense dropped Shannon for a loss of five yards on the Red Raiders’ first offensive play of overtime, quarterback Jamarcus Shines connected with Sentwali White for a touchdown pass in the left corner of the end zone, resulting in Caledonia players staring outward in disappointment.
“I’m just hurting for our youngins,” Caledonia coach Michael Kelly said. “Our kids work too hard to come out on the short end of the stick all the time. I thought our kids did what we asked them to do. We needed to make a few more stops on defense, and we need to get better as we go through division play.”
Caledonia was bolstered in the first half from two touchdown runs from Curtavis Johnson for its first two scores of the game, giving the team a 14-6 lead. Late in the second quarter, Karsten Gullette intercepted a Shannon pass and set up a touchdown run from Darrius Triplett with 38 seconds remaining in the half. The Red Raiders stayed aggressive on their next series and continued to attempt an aerial assault but turned the football over on back-to-back possessions following an Anthony Fason interception.
Caledonia was in position to take a 24-6 lead into halftime by attempting around a 26-yard field goal with 3 seconds remaining in the first half, but then disaster struck. A botched snap went over everybody’s head, and Caledonia couldn’t find a way to jump on top of the ball. Shannon scooped up the botched snap and returned it to the house as the clock hit zeros. Instead of a 24-6 advantage, Caledonia took a 21-12 lead into the break.
“He just snapped it over his head,” Kelly said of the snap. “We work on it every day, and it’s a human error. He just made a mistake. Obviously it came back to bite us in the rear end. But that’s part of the game.”
Shannon scored on its opening possession of the second half to reduce the deficit to 21-20, then later in the third quarter Gullette punched in a rushing touchdown for Caledonia to extend its lead to 28-20. The Red Raiders evened the game at 28-all with 9:10 left in the contest. Both teams failed to score for the rest of regulation.
“I thought we played well enough on offense to win the game,” Kelly said. “Obviously, that came down to a few crucial plays. … There’s a few plays here and there. My heart really goes out to our kids because they fight too hard and work too hard every week and every day. Our program is tired of being there, we have to finally take that step. Hope that’s sooner rather than later we can do it.”
Caledonia is back in action against Mooreville in a road matchup next week.
“We’ll lick our wounds and come back to work on Monday,” Kelly said. “Our kids are resilient. They show up every Monday and bust their tail. That’s why my heart is breaking for them. This isn’t about me; at the end of the day we do this for these players and they buy into it. We have to find a way to get them to be successful and get them over the top.”
Hodge is the former sports editor for The Dispatch.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 37 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.