A late fourth-quarter push was not enough for the King’s Fork High School football team on Friday, as the Bulldogs fell 35-21 to Indian River High School.

Kings Fork (2-1) looked all but done as it went into the fourth quarter down 21-0 at home. It took a resilient fourth-quarter effort for the Bulldogs to make the game interesting against the Braves, who are now 2-1.

“Indian River did a good job of taking away some of the things we wanted to do early,” coach Scottie Littles said. “I think we did a good job of containing their main guy. However, we also left some opportunities on the field.”

In the first half, the Bulldogs had two drives well into the red zone, but both were stalled by Indian River’s defense. The Braves finished the half at 7-0. If the Bulldogs had capitalized on their stalled drives, the score could have possibly been 14-7 at halftime.

King’s Fork finally got on the scoreboard in the fourth quarter. At one point they were down 35-7, but the Bulldogs remained robust in their mental approach. Indian River quarterback Keshawn Brown hurt the Bulldogs the most. He contributed two touchdowns and 314 yards of offense, with 230 of it being passing.

“Our kids fought,” Littles said. “They didn’t crumble. We were a few plays away from a different outcome. There’s going to be a time where this experience is going to be beneficial, because our team is young.”

King’s Fork has only one returning starter from last year, and Littles is excited for what this loss can do for his team in the future. Competing with one of the more talented teams in the district shows they are close to where they want to be.

“Our kids care,” he said. “They want to be good; they want to be great. They played until the final whistle. I believe we were literally a few plays away from winning that game. We are going to fight. Win or lose, when you play King’s Fork, believe that we are going to fight.”

Darran Butts had 71 yards rushing and two touchdowns. Quarterback Justin German completed 13 of his 21 pass attempts for 129 yards and rushed for 90, as well. He scored in the air and on the ground.

“Friday night we weren’t really executing like we’re supposed to,” German said. “In the last three minutes, we scored 21 points, so that told us that we knew we could execute against that team. We just didn’t do it for a full four quarters.”

It is not how a team acts when they are winning but how they regroup when faced with a loss. The Bulldogs are excited for the opportunity to get back in the win column against Western Branch.

“We are going to come back stronger this week,” German said. “It’s going to start with our preparation and film study. We will be fine.”

King’s Fork is at Western Branch at 7 p.m. on Sept. 23.

 

Indian River 0 7 14 14 35

King’s Fork 0 0 0 21 21