Over the past six years, Bearden has consistently fallen short against rival West. The frustration arguably hit its pinnacle last year when West scored a touchdown with 17.4 seconds left to win 14-10.
But Saturday night, the Bulldogs were the ones who scored the dramatic win, beating the Rebels 31-24 in triple overtime.
This was the first win against West for both the seniors and for Coach Josh Jones, who is in his third season at Bearden.
“It feels amazing [to finally beat West],” senior linebacker Kai Ironside said. “It’s been three years for me, but we’ve always been close and last year we lost on the last play, so we all knew that we could beat them.
“It showed that we just had to be a team and we were a team.”
Bearden suffered two heartbreaking late losses to state powerhouses to start the 2023 season, but bounced back to finish 9-4 and make it to the state quarterfinals for only the fourth time in school history.
The second of those losses was when the lights went out at Alcoa as Bearden was driving late in the fourth quarter trailing 17-13.
And the Tornadoes are next up for the Bulldogs on Friday night at 7.
“The win last week won’t have any effect in terms of this week on the field,” Coach Jones said. “Alcoa is a good team and they lost last week, so they’re gonna come into this game this week hungry, but we’re excited to be going in 1-0.
“We’re gonna have some positive momentum going in, but we have to try to be 1-0 again Friday night.”
Ironside led the defensive effort against West with 22 solo tackles. He said the camaraderie in this year’s group has helped them get ready for another tough schedule in 2024.
“Everyone is close, we’re all friends,” Ironside said. “We’re all trusting each other, and we’re all believing in each other.”
Senior offensive lineman Reid Rowland had added motivation against West, as he tore his ACL in that game a year ago.
“I think we came out with more effort, physicality, and I think we wanted it more than last year,” he said. “The offense is working more as a team this year.”