Tyner’s first true home game since 2022 is hard-fought playoff win

Friday night, Tyner’s football team was finally back on its own turf.

After three seasons of traveling in some fashion for all of their games, the Rams were at their new home base, hosting Watertown in the first round of the TSSAA Class 3A playoffs.

The Rams had last played a game at their own stadium in 2022, a Class 2A semifinal they followed up with the program’s second state title. Since then, it’s been 32 consecutive road trips — to places such as Giles County and Nashville Christian — while “home” games were played at fellow Hamilton County schools Central and Ooltewah.

But that wasn’t the same thing as being at Wayne Turner Field at Bob Evans Stadium, where the Rams were able to hold off the Tigers 33-20 after a hot start to move into the second round. The Region 3 champions, who improved to 10-1, will host Unicoi County (9-2) — a 28-21 winner over Sweetwater in the first round — next week, and the Rams would also be home for the quarterfinals if they advance.

(READ MORE: Final scores and photos from Friday night’s Chattanooga-area prep football games)

Tyner vs. Watertown on Nov. 7, 2025

Friday’s win was Tyner’s first playoff victory since the 2022 BlueCross Bowl at Finley Stadium, and it was a hard-earned triumph. Class 3A’s third-ranked Rams picked off four passes on defense and had a balanced offensive performance, rushing for 231 yards and throwing for 197 while ending the season for Region 4 No. 4 seed Watertown (5-6).

“We came into this game on our new field ready to work, ready to win,” said quarterback Tyler Anderson, who rushed for a team-high 86 yards. “We always have the mindset of going 1-0 every day, every practice, every down, so when we came out here today, it didn’t matter who we were against, we came to work.”

And that’s exactly how it started, as the Rams’ Antonio Edwards intercepted a pass on the first play from scrimmage, then finishing the ensuing drive with a 5-yard touchdown run. The next drive it was junior Marcus Turner — who platooned at quarterback with Anderson — finding Jamarion Dowdell, who sprinted 66 yards on a screen pass for a score.

But then the mistakes started for the home team. Penalties that killed drives, miscommunications defensively. Watertown fought back from a 21-7 deficit to close to within 27-20 with 9:48 to play, but the Rams responded with a short drive finished by D’Aerion McNealy’s touchdown run with 6:20 to play.

Jumocka Willis then picked off a Garrett Davis pass in the end zone to seal the win.

“What these guys have been through, what our coaching staff has been through, people see it from the outside, but they don’t see it from the inside,” said Tyner third-year head coach Christian Mainor, who earned his first playoff victory in his current role after serving as the team’s offensive coordinator before that.

“What we’ve been through the last three years is tough, so the emotions were high and you could see that. I thought we came out really well offensively and defensively. We had a lull there kind of in the middle of the game, but I was really proud of the stops we had there late with our defense.”

Both teams finished with 11 penalties, but the Rams put the game away by going 7-for-10 on third-down conversions and not turning the ball over.

Dowdell had 156 yards on five touches with a pair of scores in the win, while McNealy rushed for 79 yards.

Davis threw for 254 yards and three scores while also rushing for 68 yards to lead the Tigers.

Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com.