SARDIS – New Sardis head coach Chris Stephenson said in all his years coaching, Friday’s first half against DAR might have been the worst one he’s ever had a team play.

But the Lions found a way to turn it around in the second half, using a bruising running game that found the end zone twice and a defense that pitched a second-half shutout, lifting the Lions to a season-opening 16-14 win.

“Cold,” Stephenson said after getting the Gatorade bath as the final horn sounded. “It feels good, it’s what this community needed, it’s what the school needed, it’s what I needed, our coaching staff, the players, the students, it’s just a community thing and everybody needed that shot of life.”

New quarterback Blaze Gerhart rushed for 186 yards in the win, while Levi Martin added 70 yards, including the game-winning touchdown in the fourth quarter, to go with a sack and an interception on defense. In total, the Lions rushed for 298 yards in the win, while the defense held the Patriots to negative one rushing yards.

After a three-and-out from each team to open the game, it was the Sardis defense that opened the scoring. Pinning DAR back at their own nine, on third down from the six a host of Lion pass rushers led by Wesley Cooper met at the quarterback, bringing him down in the end zone for a 2-0 lead.

The Lions were unable to capitalize with the free kick, and DAR found its stride on offense on the ensuing possession.

The Patriots turned to the air to get things going, eventually reaching the Sardis 43, where a direct snap on a fake punt eeked out a first down, followed by Trey Bolt hitting AJ McCamey on the next play for a 39-yard touchdown pass and a 7-2 lead for DAR late in the first.

DAR stretched the lead to 14-2 on its next series, again seeing McCamey hit a big passing play, this time for 26 yards before Brady Largen capped the drive with a three-yard run.

Bolt finished the game 11 of 25 for 213 yards and the score, while McCamey hauled in five balls for 130 yards.

DAR looked to stretch the lead before the half, but Martin picked off a Bolt pass with under five to play in the half, keeping it a 12-point game.

“All these years I’ve coached, I’ve never had a worse first half in my career. I just thought, ‘Maybe this is the Sardis jinx or whatever,’ but I told them, we have to finish the game,” Stephenson said. “If we’ll sell out and do what we’re supposed to, they were getting tired, and we saw it, and we just took full advantage of it with the run game.”

With the ball out of the break, the Lions simplified the game after completing just three passes in the first half, and turned to their running game.

That strategy paid dividends immediately, burning half the third quarter clock, going 84 yards all on the ground, and racking up six first downs before Derek Tarvin capped the drive with a three-yard score. Gerhart hit tight end Eli Morton in the end zone for a two-point conversion to make it 14-10.

After a three-and-out from the Lion defense, Sardis saw its next drive end in an interception, but the defense again stiffened, forcing a turnover on downs at their own 33 to keep it a one-score game.

That’s when Sardis went back to the ground game, with Gerhart hitting for 23 and 39 yards on the drive, eventually setting up Martin, who went around the right side from three yards out to give the Lions at 16-14 lead after the two-point attempt failed.

“When you’ve got kids and they show up every day, and they’re walking around hurt, they’ve not finished a game in two or three years,” Stephenson added. “For them to come out and mash and mash and mash like that speaks volumes of their character.”

From there the Sardis defense put the game to rest, but not before DAR got one last scare in late. The Lion defense forced a three-and-out, and after the offense drove in Patriot territory, eating over four minutes of clock before throwing an interception, DAR had one last shot to win the game.

Facing 4th and 24, Bolt hit McCamey for exactly 24 yards to reach their own 40, but after three incompletions in a row, Sardis’ Alex Davis put the game away, coming around the line untouched and smashing Bolt as he let the ball go, watching it fall to the ground, securing the win.

“They did a great job tonight. They saved us,” Stephenson said of the defense. “When you look at the game as a whole, they saved us, I couldn’t be more proud. I know I keep saying finish, but that’s what the defense had to do to win the game. They’re exhausted because we have so many who go both ways.”

The win is the first season-opening win for Sardis since the 2018 season. The Lions will look to make it two-straight for the first time since 2019 when they travel to New Hope next Friday.

“They’ll be ready,” Stephenson concluded. “We’ll be there first game, so they’ll have plenty of film and we won’t have a lot on them. We’ve got to learn to win, and learning to win is just as much coaching as anything is. Yeah, we’ve tied last year’s win total, but let’s get number two, and then three, and then four.”

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