Bears bury the Bulldogs

For much of the last decade, the road to the State Championship in 2A football has gone right through District 15.

After defeating Cooper 34-15 last week, the Timpson Bears are ready for another trip through District 15 as they get ready to meet Refugio following the Bobcats’ elimination of Shiner.

Every year, the Shiner Comanches travel less than an hour down to Victoria then another half hour or so down to Refugio to take on the Bobcats, their fierce district rival.

A few weeks later—usually in Victoria—the two play again in the Regional Championship. As often as not, the winner of that game has been crowned state champions two weeks later.

“It’s kind of become a tradition,” Shiner head coach Jason Herring said last year. “We’ve both worked real hard to get here.”

In last year’s regional semi-final, 11,000 fans came to see the game, which is remarkable since the population of both cities together is about 4,800.

“They are the 2A blue bloods,” Coach Tracy Adair said a few years ago as one of the schools had finished its state championship that season. “They both have an awesome tradition.”

Then two years ago from a little hamlet just as far east but much farther north than the Bobcats and Comanches, a den of Bears showed up to challenge those traditions.

“I don’t really care which one of them we play,” Timpson’s Coach Kerry Therwhanger said Friday night in Lindale. “I just know that our path to Arlington Texas has got to go through one of those two schools.”

It’s really a lopsided trip from Timpson to Arlington through District 15: Hwy 59 down through Victoria, then 77 to Refugio and back up to US 90 west of Katy. Then catch I-45 for the rest of the night.”

But it’s been on the minds of almost everyone in Timpson for two seasons. The Bears, the state’s new kid on the block, ripped through its own powerful district (#8 Joaquin pushed the undefeated Bears much harder than anyone has in the playoffs), to lose its first game and end its season in the final four against Shiner.

“I’ve been proud of our guys for concentrating and focusing on the here and now,” said Therwhanger. “You can’t get all caught up in Shiner and Refugio. If you do, you won’t be playing those guys. You’ll be watching them on TV in the state final round.”

So instead of heading down toward Matagorda Bay where the Comanche hunts Bobcat, the Bears traveled northwest to Lindale to meet the Cooper Bulldogs. Shelby County fans got to know those Bulldogs the week before when they upset the Joaquin Rams in Tyler by 22 points.

“Cooper really impressed me,” broadcaster Stephen Shires said. “They have a complete mastery of the option attack, and they tackled as good or better than any team we watched this year in 4A ball.”

Like Joaquin, Cooper’s game is clock-control power running. In their first possession, they ran over the Bears with a 76 yard, 14 play drive to take the first lead, 7-0.

“That’s the Cooper trademark,” Shires said. Most of the damage was done by Canon Ingram, the younger brother of Colin Ingram. The two combined for most of the Bulldog offense all night long.

Timpson’s first drive ended in a punt, but after one first down the Bears forced a Bulldog punt. This is where the Bears offense was ignited: it mounted a 7-play scoring drive ending with a Terry Bussey touchdown run. The missed extra point left Cooper with a 1-point lead.

Both teams produced time-consuming drives whether points were produced or not. Cooper would get the ball to begin the third quarter, so their drive late in the second took on considerable importance. They drove to into Timpson territory before being forced to punt. The Bears blocked the punt and took the momentum away with a 7-play, 53-yard scoring drive. The half ended with a 13-7 Timpson lead.

At the half, both bands performed, but neither performed its contest drill. The Bears twirlers performed, and its band played while facing the Timpson crowd on the visitors’ side. The Timpson drum major/twirler/trumpet player impressed by performing all three duties during the band’s performance.

“And in the spring, I’ll pick up my French horn,” she said in a halftime interview.

In the second half, Bussey and company slowly took over. Timpson prevented Cooper from getting anything going with that opening possession, then took their first possession of the quarter and parleyed it into 7 points with a drive that featured Bussey running, passing, and sometimes doing both.

“He is so versatile,” announcer Larry Pierce said. “He looks completely committed to the run, then suddenly he’s throwing a dart 40 yards. Unreal.”

With its whole offense on his back, quarterback Colin Ingram converted several third and fourth down plays and put the Bulldogs on the board in the second half to re-establish a one-score game, 20-14.

But the fourth quarter was all Timpson. The Bears found the end zone twice while stopping a promising Cooper drive, outscoring Cooper 14-0 in the quarter and winning the Region III Championship for the third year in a row, 34-14.

“Proud of our guys, very proud of the way we learned and corrected,” Therwhanger said after the game.

And so, the state’s new kid isn’t so new anymore: three consecutive regional championships puts you on football fans’ maps and on rivals’ radar.

While Timpson was beating Cooper, Refugio was topping Shiner for the second time this year to win its first Regional Championship in three years.

Timpson and Refugio haven’t met this century; it was Shiner who sent practically the whole population of Timpson and much of Shelby County home the past two seasons.

But on Thursday, Refugio will wave at the Comanches as they drive by Shiner. Timpson will honk at the Rams and Dragons as they leave Shelby County. They’ll meet in Houston where Refugio will be 3-point favorites, making Timpson the underdogs for the first time this season.

Though Timpson spent most of the year as #1, the experts couldn’t resist giving that distinction to the blue bloods from Refugio as the playoffs progressed. It will be the hungry state #3 challenging the established state #1.

But after two trips to the final four, the Bears understand something about state championships: you can’t climb to the top of your state until you knock the guys backwards who have gotten here before you and think they own the place. ---- (Timpson v Refugio will be played Thursday, December8 at 6:00 in the Berry Center of Northwest Houston. Listen free on KGAS 104.3 FM or catch the live-stream on NFHSNetwork. com. Stephen Shires and Chris Watlington have requested the game from the NFHS but as of press time, the assignments of broadcast teams have not been communicated.)