Freshmen: d. Adrian 49-42
JV: d. by Adrian 13-19
Varsity: 3-1 (0-1 SEC White)

Varsity 2008 vs. Adrian: 41-31w

The SEC’s rampant expansion and realignment wrought yet another change to Chelsea’s world: Adrian, a burgeoning rival of the Bulldogs, moved from the big-boned SEC Red to the svelte SEC White, making the Maples a direct conference rival.  That meant Chelsea’s week 4 encounter with Adrian wasn’t just a game featuring two of the SEC’s better teams; in Adrian’s first season in the SEC White, it was a clash of two of the favorites to win the division.  Seriously, it was a big game: though more than half the season still remained, this game promised to go a long way in deciding the SEC White champion.  A game of that magnitude might have attracted bushels and pecks of hype, but since this particular Game of Awesome didn’t involve a team from Ann Arbor, four or maybe five people outside Chelsea and Adrian knew there was a game.

Chelsea entered the game undefeated, but Adrian didn’t have such good fortune: the Leaves fell to Saline in overtime in their week 2 non-conference conference game.  But the schedule smiled on Adrian following that loss by providing a week 3 stress ball in the form of perennially hapless Dexter, and a convincing victory put the Fronds back in a winning mindset just in time for their trip to Jerry Niehaus Field.

“Good game…good game…good game…good game…”

How powerful is Blake Blaha?  When he does jumping jacks, the earth tilts.

All Coach Bush said was, “Who wants a fist bump?”

Despite its extraordinary amount of almost-hype, the game started just like every other game: with a kickoff.  This particular kickoff landed in the arms of a Not-Toronto Leaf, a fact Chelsea regretted when, twelve plays and 78 yards later, Adrian took a 7-0 lead.  After a Chelsea punt, the Maples had hopes of staging another lengthy scoring drive; however, they forgot one minor detail: scoring requires possession.  The Fronds handed the ball back to Chelsea by way of a fumble only three plays into the drive, a mistake they regretted when, on the very next play, the Bulldog offense went one and WOOOOO! with a Nick Hill twenty yard touchdown run.

With the score evened and the scores odd, the Chelsea defense dug in its heels and forced a three and out.  That set up a 37-yard catch by Chris Ballow, which set up a 14-yard catch by Ballow, which set up a 26-yard touchdown run by Hill to give the Bulldogs their first lead of the game.  A missed extra point limited the lead to six points, but a lead is a superiority is an ascendancy, so I wasn’t complaining.  The local happiness continued with another Adrian three and out — or, as the cool kids call it, a throut — and Charlie Hess finished a drive with a 29-yard field goal to extend the lead to 16-7.

This is totally going on YouTube.

No, Dakota Cooley isn’t angry with you.  Not yet, anyway.

A Dakota Cooley interception prompted further optimism, but the ensuing drive ended in a punt, and that led to trouble for the Bulldogs.  Buoyed by good field position and the scent of touchdowns in the cool autumn air, the Leaves strolled down the field and scored with only seventeen seconds left in the half.  Chelsea’s lead was down to a mere two, and as halftime loomed, it was obvious: the SEC White Game of Awesome was indeed proving to be awesome.

Scott Devol has always been the affectionate type.

Is Brian Paulsen purposely posing like the Statue of Liberty?  Nobody knows.

Chelsea received the second half kick with intentions of replicating Adrian’s first drive, but fourth and long tends to get in the way of that sort of thing.  And when the punt team took the field, the Bulldogs suffered from the first of their two Blue Screens of Death: the snap sailed over punter Nate Udell’s head, giving the Fronds possession inside Chelsea’s 20.  The Bulldog defense stood tall, holding Adrian out of the end zone, but the damage was done: the Maples reclaimed the lead with a short field goal.

Irked by the essentially free points they’d just handed Adrian, Chelsea put together a 13-play, 87-yard drive and emphatically snatched back the lead with a one-yard touchdown run by Brian Paulsen.  Another missed extra point held the lead at five, but it didn’t seem to be a big deal; after another Adrian throut, the Bulldogs made the Maple defense look practically invisible as they effortlessly marched inside the ten yard line.  All was well and good for Chelsea — until the second Blue Screen of Death struck.  On first and goal from the three, Hill fumbled the ball, and it ended up in the arms of a pleasantly surprised Adrian defender.

Chris Ballow was tackled by the terrifying two-headed three-legged defensive monster.

“Get that camera out of my face!”

Nick Hill prefers not to share.

Though the turnover was a boon for the Fronds, it left them with nearly the entire field to cover for a go-ahead touchdown — a task made more daunting by their offense’s surprising dormancy in the third quarter.  (Would you believe Adrian didn’t gain a single first down the entire third quarter?)  But to the great dismay of the Chelsea faithful, the Leaves lumbered down the field, devouring both yardage and time on their march towards the end zone.  The Bulldog defense provided a glimmer of hope when, facing first and goal on the two, it stiffened and forced Adrian into fourth and goal from the four; however, the fourth-down pass was complete for the touchdown, giving the Maples the lead once again.  A successful two-point conversion pushed Adrian’s lead to three, leaving Chelsea four minutes to find enough points to stay in the game.

The final drive had a promising beginning as Chelsea moved to the Adrian 42 with 1:30 to play; with two timeouts left, the Bulldogs seemed certain at least to attempt a game-tying field goal before time expired.  However, the drive died at the 37 when the Maple defense sacked Paulsen on fourth down.  Adrian failed to gain a first down, but it didn’t matter; when their final punt was downed, the clock read all zeros on Chelsea’s first loss of the season.

Odds & Ends

• Chief among the many frustrations of this loss was this: statistically, Chelsea outperformed Adrian in nearly every category.  But the two missed extra points and the two Blue Screens of Death, along with Adrian’s backbreaking fourth-quarter drive, doomed the Bulldogs.
• The field turned into a bit of a hospital ward: as the game wore on, a number of players were limping, one Adrian player was taken off on the cart, and one Chelsea player was missing a chunk of his lip.  Also, Nick Hill was fighting cramps the entire second half.
• Despite the loss and his painful cramps, Hill had a productive evening: he rushed 37 times for 222 yards and 2 touchdowns.

Next Week
The Bulldogs face the Railsplitters of Lincoln; the game is in Chelsea on Friday at 7:00PM.