While I called the Warren win over Dardanelle in the 4A semi-finals last week, I was sure that Malvern would get by Mena but the Leopards were beaten rather soundly.
Dardanelle was 14-0 for the season before the Warren game, and actually led 16-7 going into the fourth quarter. The Lumberjacks came up with a field goal and touchdown to pull out the victory 17-16 and head to the state finals for the second straight season.
Warren fell to Booneville in the finals last year in the final game of Booneville's 4A classification. A poultry processing facility burned down in Booneville, and when the company decided against rebuilding, hundreds of jobs were lost with the resulting loss of students in the local school district.
I believed that with most of their team back this year and being the top returning squad from a year ago that they would likely find their way back into the finals this season. That turned out to be right.
Speaking of Wright, Jarious that is, a former Lumberjack receiver made headlines for the Minnesota Vikings this weekend when he scored an 87-yard touchdown in overtime to help his team defeat the New York Jets 30-24 in overtime. Quite a few Warren athletes make their way onto college football fields and later some make the professional ranks.
Mena is a solid football team, but they profited from a mistake-prone Malvern team to reach the finals. Warren tends to play a fairly mistake free brand of football and I think they want to finish what they started last year. I predict a Warren victory by 6 in the game set for this Saturday.
Hogs finally in a bowl!
After a couple years of lackluster football, the Razorbacks made the upturn this year under second-year coach Bret Bielema, going 6-6 which netted them an invite to the Texas Bowl in Houston. They will play opposite their longtime nemesis Texas, a team that has fallen on hard times these past few years.
After the Southwest Conference broke up, Texas and Arkansas didn't play each other much. Counting a Cotton Bowl and four other games, the Hogs have managed to stack up a winning 3-2 won-loss record against their foe since 1990.
Texas has the same mark as Arkansas (6-6) but did not play near the quality of teams that the Hogs did. As a matter of fact, all of the other six teams in the Razorbacks conference division were ranked in the nation's top 10 at one time or another this season.
Texas has a new coach, Charlie Strong, who happens to be from Batesville. That may be good sign for Texas as the last time they had an Arkansas native coaching them (Darrell Royal) they became a national powerhouse.
The game is at 8 p.m. Dec. 29 and will be on ESPN.
Bentonville repeats in 7A, maybe the last time?
Bentonville was picked to win by 9 points by Hooten's this year after the Tigers blew the Bulldogs out 45-2 in the season finale a month ago. However, the last two times Bentonville and Fayetteville met in the finals, the Tigers had handled the 'Dogs in the regular season only to lose in the finals.
It looked for a time that history would repeat itself when Fayetteville forged ahead of the Tigers 21-17 with less than 3 minutes left. Bentonville had led the whole game until the closing minutes when the Dogs made a comeback.
This time proved different to be different as the Tigers refused to lose, driving more 80 yards to score in the closing seconds to take the win, the fourth state title for Bentonville coach Barry Lunney since he arrived in Bentonville 10 years ago.
Fayetteville had a lot of underclassmen make significant contributions in their post season success (they finished fourth in the league) while the Tigers are losing significant squad members. Rumors abound that this might be the last year that Lunney coaches the Tigers.
Bentonville will split their high school in a little over a year from now which will likely end their domination of 7A West football. The Tigers have won 10 straight league titles and haven't lost a regular season game to Fayetteville during that stretch.
Is something wrong with the Arkansas state coach?
The Arkansas State Red Wolves accepted their fourth straight bid to play in the Go-Daddy Bowl. Their head coach, Blake Anderson, will accompany the team to the game in Mobile, Ala., which is set to play Jan. 4.
Though this is the fourth straight trip for the Red Wolves to get to Mobile, this will be the first time their head coach for the season will make this trip with them.
In 2011, head coach Hugh Freeze coached them to a great season, but left the team to take the coaching job at Mississippi before the bowl game. In 2012, Gus Mahlzahn also coached the Red Wolves to a good record and a Go-Daddy berth but left the team before the game to take the Auburn job. Last year, Bryan Harsin did a good job as coach, getting ASU another bid to the Mobile game but bailed on the team when offered the head job at Boise State.
So it begs the question: Why hasn't any major university offered Anderson a head job somewhere?
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Editor's note: John McGee is an award-winning columnist and sports writer. He writes a regular sports column for The Times. He can be contacted through The Times at [email protected].
Sports on 12/10/2014