GEARY – As the Tri-County Fair got going blocks away, the Geary Bison matched up Friday night with the Sharon-Mutual Trojans for one of the last football games of the season.
Geary scored first during the contest, earning its first points in several weeks. But a spate of penalties and a ferocious Trojans offense ultimately doomed the Bison, as they fell 38- 14 after tacking on a last-minute touchdown to narrow the margin.
The loss drops Geary to 1-6 on the year, while Sharon-Mutual is now 3-6.
Friday’s game started as well as it possibly could for Geary, as it won the coin toss and elected to receive the opening kick. Raul Espinoza picked up the ball just before it bounced out of bounds, which could have gifted the Bison good field position. Instead, he cut right and ran straight through the Trojans, returning the kick 83 yards for a touchdown.
The dream start continued when Sharon-Mutual fumbled away its very first snap of the game, as quarterback Tabor Marlatt lost the ball while falling to the ground and Jace Nelson pounced on top of it.
Still, Geary could not take advantage of its great field position. It took the ball at the Trojan 35 and did manage a first down, but was saddled with two 10-yard penalties on the drive and ultimately turned the ball over on downs after quarterback Major Lewis was sacked.
This time, Sharon-Mutual didn’t make a mistake. It quickly drove 76 yards down the field and capped its drive with a 31-yard touchdown pass to Kaden Spray, going up 8-6 on a two-point conversion.
The penalties really started to stack up for Geary on its next possession, frustrating the players, coaches and fans. Geary was penalized three consecutive times to start the drive, for two holds and a block in the back, giving the Bison a first-and-thirty-plus that they naturally couldn’t convert.
The Bison had three potential touchdowns called back for penalties during the game.
Coaches grew more frustrated with perceived non-calls in the other direction as Sharon-Mutual began to pull away. It scored twice more in the second quarter and entered the half up 22-6.
Trailing by 32 in the fourth quarter, the Bison had every excuse to quit. But they took the ball with about 7 minutes to play and strung together a 12-play, 65-yard drive that ate up nearly six and a half minutes and was capped by a successful two-point conversion pass from Lewis to Jaydin Leger. That brought the game to its final score of 38-14.
After the game, Geary head coach Jason Goodknight said it felt at times like Geary was “fighting more than the other (team).”
He praised his team’s composure under the circumstances. “It’s something where these young men have moved from boys into ‘man’ status,” Goodknight said. “They’ve taken their lumps. They understand what we’ve got to do. And I think that me, just stepping out there and going to battle for them with the refs and stuff like that, kind of calmed them down a little bit. But it also pumped them up a little bit, too.”
Geary returns this Friday, Nov. 5 for its final game of the season, a home matchup with Beaver at 7 p.m.