Oct. 11, 2019 George Washington Game
Game Statistics / Game Photos
Rally Attempt Fails as PHS Falls to GW 34-21
CHARLESTON - Another wild finish for the Parkersburg Big Red football team but this time it didn’t turn out as hoped as George Washington held on for a 34-21 win that included a touchdown for the home team on the final, untimed play of the game.
After falling behind 28-7 early in the fourth quarter the Big Reds scored twice to pull within a touchdown and had two possessions in the final 3:30 of the game but could not pull out another miracle win and fell to 3-3 overall on the season while the host Patriots remained unbeaten at home and upped their record to 4-3.
PHS went 79 yards in seven plays to pull within a touchdown on Bryson Singer’s 19 yard pass to Sam Potts with 5:51 remaining in the contest and then got the ball back twice after forcing GW punts only to shoot themselves in the foot with penalties on the first possession. The final Big Red offensive attempt started from its own nine yard line with just 38 seconds left. What would have been the last PHS play saw at least a dozen laterals in a wild play that was nullified by offsetting penalties. On the untimed down play, PHS tried a pass behind the line, another pass back and then fumbled on a lateral attempt with GW picking up the loose ball and running it into the end zone from 19 yards away to account for the final 13 points margin.
Patriot quarterback R.T. Alexander (son of former WVU running back great Robert) completed 17 of 28 passes for 250 yards, finding Brayden McCallister with touchdown tosses of 6 and 23 yards in the first quarter, and Alex Mazelon with a 21-yarder in the third quarter as GW went up 21-0.
The Big Reds were led by sophomore quarterback Singer who ran for 137 yards including a 64 yard touchdown scamper that finally put PHS on the scoreboard midway through the third quarter after they had fallen behind 21-0. But Singer completed just seven of 19 passes for 57 yards and one interception. He did find Potts for the TD in the fourth quarter.
A lackluster first half was followed by Singer’s big run and after allowing GW to score again to go up 28-7. Braeden Mason provided some heroics with a 93 yard kickoff return up the middle to make it 28-14 with 10:36 left to play. After forcing a punt, PHS responded with its 79 yard drive that was capped by Potts’ TD catch to cut the lead to seven points. Singer had a 32 yard run on that series.
Parkersburg was its own worst enemy at times, committing turnovers on each of the two possessions where it crossed midfield in the first half, twice lining up offside on offense before the ball was snapped and being flagged twice in a row for false starts on a fourth-quarter punt. The Big Reds had 10 penalties.
“We came out flat,’’ said coach Mike Byus, “and I don’t know if you can call it the off week or call it the traveling, but mentally we were not ready to play. We played a little bit of defense in the first half, but we didn’t play any offense. We executed nothing well and kept shooting ourselves in the foot.
“We score those 21 points in the first half, then we’ve got a game. I’m disappointed, but also encouraged with the fight at the end. They played with great effort in the fourth quarter and turned it on. I don’t know where the switch was flipped, but the bottom line is it’s a 48-minute game and we didn’t play 48 minutes.’’
Defensively for PHS, C.J. Wade had 15 tackles (including two sacks) and Gage Fiore 10 while Mason came up with five solo stops in the secondary and four pass break ups.
#10 Parkersburg vs #12 George Washington (Oct 11, 2019 at Charleston)
Score by Quarters 1 2 3 4 Total
Parkersburg 0 0 7 14 - 21
George Washington 14 0 7 13 - 34
Qtr Time Scoring play
1st 07:18 GW - Brayden McCallister 6 yd pass from R.T. Alexander (Michael Hughes kick), 9-30 4:42
03:38 GW - Brayden McCallister 23 yd pass from R.T. Alexander (Michael Hughes kick), 5-68 2:18
3rd 07:53 GW - Alex Mazelon 21 yd pass from R.T. Alexander (Michael Hughes kick), 6-76 2:24
07:32 PHS - Bryson Singer 64 yd run (Sam Potts kick), 1-64 0:13
4th 10:51 GW - DAnthony Wright 32 yd run (Michael Hughes kick), 5-52 1:09
10:36 PHS - Braeden Mason 93 yd kickoff return (Sam Potts kick)
05:51 PHS - Sam Potts 19 yd pass from Bryson Singer (Sam Potts kick), 7-79 2:41
00:00 GW - Kristian Hussel 19 yd fumble recovery
............................................................PHS GW
FIRST DOWNS 13 19
RUSHES-YARDS (NET) 30-172 37-124
PASSING YDS (NET) 57 248
Passes Att-Comp-Int 19-7-1 28-17-1
TOTAL OFFENSE PLAYS-YARDS 49-229 65-372
Fumble Returns-Yards 0-0 1-19
Punt Returns-Yards 2-7 3-41
Kickoff Returns-Yards 5-207 4-119
Interception Returns-Yards 1-40 1-16
Punts (Number-Avg) 6-40.0 6-39.8
Fumbles-Lost 3-2 2-0
Penalties-Yards 10-78 10-92
Possession Time 18:28 29:32
Third-Down Conversions 0 of 10 6 of 14
Fourth-Down Conversions 1 of 1 1 of 1
Red-Zone Scores-Chances 1-1 2-3
Sacks By: Number-Yards 3-23 0-0
RUSHING: Big Reds-Bryson Singer 20-137; Anthony Craig 8-36; Braeden Mason 1-5; Sam Potts 1-minus 6.
George Washington-DAnthony Wright 15-57; Isaac Isabell 7-53; R.T. Alexander 14-13; Hasten Pinkerton 1-1.
PASSING: Big Reds-Bryson Singer 7-19-1-57. George Washington-R.T. Alexander 17-28-1-248.
RECEIVING: Big Reds-Braeden Mason 5-30; Sam Potts 1-19; Jacob Campbell 1-8. George Washington-Brayden McCallister 7-97; Alex Mazelon 5-80; Luke Grimm 5-71.
INTERCEPTIONS: Big Reds-Xadrian Snodgrass 1-40. George Washington-Isaac Isabell 1-16.
FUMBLES: Big Reds-Bryson Singer 3-2. George Washington-R.T. Alexander 2-0.
Big Reds (3-3) vs. George Washington (4-3)
Total elapsed time: 3:17
