[09/09/02]Before they provided one of the most memorable finishes to a high school football game in a long time Friday night, Warren Central and No. 18 McComb did their best to make the game one of the ugliest in recent memory.

For three quarters both teams dropped balls, fumbled balls, mishandled kickoffs, made mistakes in pass coverage, and bungled plays on special teams.

The teams combined for 16 fumbles, including seven in the first quarter alone. Each team had a long snap sail over the head of the punter, resulting in a safety, and WC also had a punt blocked and another attempt thwarted by a snap that glanced off the hands of punter Greg Carroll.

“I wouldn’t necessarily call it sloppy, but it wasn’t sloppy because of the effort,” WC coach Robert Morgan said.

A heavy rainstorm about an hour before the game could have been responsible for some of the early miscues. The storm drenched the field and made for muddy conditions and slick footballs.

Even with the storm, however, the video tape of the opening quarter could pass for a “Football Follies” blooper reel.

McComb turned the ball over three times before it ran its second play from scrimmage. Fullback Eltrio Spears, an upman on the kickoff team, had two short kickoffs bounce off his hands and both were recovered by the Vikings.

Spears also mishandled the opening kickoff of the second half, and another McComb player dropped a fourth kickoff that the Tigers were able to recover.

“They’ve got a fast guy that returned it, and we were just trying to get it to one of their slower players,” WC kicker Will Clark said.

The Tigers also fumbled on their first offensive play, a turnover the Vikings were able to cash in on when Richmond Fields ran 51 yards for a touchdown to give WC a 7-0 lead. Fields ended the game with 142 yards, his second straight game that he has eclipsed the 100-yard mark.

McComb’s second possession lasted three plays before the Tigers fumbled it away, and their third ended in a high snap over the head of punter Patrick Barnes and out of the end zone for a safety and a 9-0 WC lead.

“We just didn’t handle it. Warren Central didn’t fumble the ball that much,” McComb coach Ted Milton said. “We were very fortunate to be in the ballgame at halftime, because we had four turnovers in the first half.”

WC was just as careless with the football, but its mistakes didn’t hurt until the second half. The Vikings fumbled four times in the first half, but only lost one and led 9-0 at halftime.

McComb’s first points came on a safety when the ball was snapped over the head of Carroll and into the end zone with just under four minutes to play in the third quarter. Carroll caught up to the ball before the Tiger defenders and shoveled it out of the end zone for a safety to prevent further damage.

“At the beginning of the game, (the ball) was slick. Our managers did a good job of keeping it dry,” WC quarterback Jeremy Ferguson said.

McComb’s mistakes actually worked to its benefit early in the fourth quarter, when the Tigers recovered one of their own fumbles in the end zone for a touchdown and a 10-9 lead.

And that’s when the teams stopped the sloppy play and started the unforgettable final stretch.

The Vikings and Tigers combined for four lead changes in the final 11 minutes, capped by the Vikings’ incredible final drive.

Backed up at their own 3-yard line with 1:03 to play and the score tied 16-16, WC drove 95 yards in the next minute to set up Clark’s game-winning 20-yard field goal as time expired.

The Vikings had two long pass plays cut in half when the receivers stepped out of bounds as they eluded defenders. On the first play of the drive, Larry King caught a pass along the left sideline and cut all the way back across the field as he ran to the McComb 3. He was ruled out of bounds at the WC 46, however.

Morgan said the Viking coaching staff thought about sitting on the ball and playing for overtime.

“To be honest, that went through our minds,” Morgan said. “But that worked out all right.”