CLEVELAND, Tenn. - Sometimes it's not the mistakes a football team makes that defines it. It's about how that team overcomes those mistakes.
The Ooltewah Owls made a defining statement Friday night, coming back from a couple of costly errors and a 20-point deficit to defeat host Bradley Central 28-27 in a key Region 2-6A opener.
"This feels amazing," senior quarterback Kyrell Sanford said. "This shows that we can overcome anything. Adversity hurts a lot of people, but we overcame it tonight."
Sanford led the way for Ooltewah (2-1) with 276 all-purpose yards as he was an efficient 19-of-26 through the air for 172 yards and two touchdowns and carried the ball 14 times for 104 yards.
Sanford almost had a better stat line, if it had not been for the first major setback the Owls faced in the game.
Ooltewah had the ball near midfield with 20 seconds to go in the half, and that's when Sanford hit Sincere Quinn on a 47-yard bomb for what appeared to be a huge touchdown that would have cut the Bears' lead to 21-14 heading into halftime.
The score was wiped out, however, by an illegal procedure penalty that infuriated Owls' coach Scott Chandler and brought a chorus of boos from the visiting crowd.
"I told them at halftime that the issues didn't have anything to do with scheme," Chandler said. "It had to do with intensity. Last week against Science Hill, we were intense. That first half we were just going through the motions."
The intensity level was much higher coming out of halftime, but that immediately changed after Ooltewah gift-wrapped another scoring drive for the Bears (1-2) when they failed to recover a pooch kick to start the third quarter.
Two plays later, Bears quarterback Dylan Standifer hit Saylor Clark for the second touchdown of the game for the duo. After a botched snap on the extra point that didn't seem too important then but would later play a crucial role, the Bears led 27-7.
The Owls took the ball down the field on the next drive in just more than two minutes, and Sincere Quinn's 19-yard touchdown closed the gap to 27-14 and gave his team a little of that intensity back.
From that point, Ooltewah's defense was stifling, and momentum clearly shifted in its direction. Bradley Central totaled 250 total yards in the first half but had only 71 in the second.
The offense fed off of the defense, as Quinn punched in another score from 2 yards out on the next possession and then Sanford hit Fisher Perry on a 17-yard touchdown pass that took the Owls into the final quarter up by one.
The defense continued to dominate, and while the Bears had a few chances to take the lead, Peter Dyr's interception with 30 seconds left sealed the victory.
"The more stops we got, we just built up energy," Dyr said. "I think this earned us some respect we deserve, because Bradley is a really good team."
Said Chandler: "We're still trying to find our identity as a team. We're trying to take care of each other and love each other. Tonight is going to go a long way."
Standifer led the Bears with 16-of-26 passing for 188 yards and two touchdowns, and he added one touchdown on the ground.
Contact Kevin Llewallyn at sports@timesfreepress.com.