Freshmen: d.  by Pioneer 12-56
JV: d. Pioneer 31-27

Varsity 2008 record: 6-1 (5-1 SEC)

After beating the #2 Adrian Maples, Chelsea continued its 2008 Tour Of Single-Digit Teams with the #9 Ann Arbor Pioneering Pioneers of Pioneer.  The teams came into the game remarkably evenly matched: Chelsea was 5-1, its record marred only by a 14-34 loss to Saline; Pioneer, too, was 5-1, its record marred only by a 3-21 loss to Adrian.  Naturally, those losses provided a clear and indisputable clue as to the better team:

• Chelsea beat Adrian; Adrian beat Pioneer; therefore, Chelsea > Pioneer.

Of course:

• Pioneer beat Saline; Saline beat Chelsea; therefore, Pioneer > Chelsea.

Uh … so yeah, like I said, the teams came into the game remarkably evenly matched, and I don’t know anyone who would use foolishly compartmentalized comparisons to divine a hint of superiority in one of the teams.  Do you know anyone who would do that?  No, of course you don’t.

That’s the strangest pushup I’ve ever seen.

Kyle Whitley demonstrates the “Superhero Riding On Top Of A Moving Vehicle” pose.

Anyway, with the teams being so evenly matched and so prone to winning, the game promised to be a rollicking riot of football entertainment.  That entertainment would include Pioneer’s own Studly Stud McStuderson, Nader Furrha, another Donovan McNabby sort of quarterback fond of running around, throwing around and winning around; of course, Chelsea would be countering with Nick Hill, who set a school record a week earlier with 312 rushing yards against an Adrian defense not noted for giving up school records.  In other words, barring miraculous defensive performances, the best description of the evening was bound to be the same as the best description of the Adrian game: “Whee!”  (For those with a more defensive perspective, a better description would be “What just happened, and why is the referee holding his arms up in the air like that?”  But thanks to TV’s effect on sports — Ratings are down!  Change the rules so there’s more scoring! — defense just isn’t cool anymore.)

Jake Hash probably doesn’t have any cell reception right now.

“I don’t care what you say; I’m not going to sing the national anthem.”

It didn’t take long for that description to become accurate; in fact, it didn’t take any time at all.  A2P3’s kickoff sailed into the end zone for a touchback — which meant the clock didn’t run — and on the very next play, Hill broke free for a 58-yard gain; a few plays later, Michael Roberts took the ball into the end zone.  Pioneer’s first drive ended in a punt, and Chelsea continued its freewheeling ways with another touchdown by Roberts; not quite eight minutes into the game, Chelsea had a pleasantly surprising 14-point lead and one burning question: would it last?

“I know they do that in spy movies to see if anyone’s following them, but … well, this isn’t a spy movie, Michael.”

Well … given the talent level of the Fighting Purple Redundancies, of course it wouldn’t last.  Pioneer drove the ball 80 yards to cut Chelsea’s lead in half at the end of the first quarter — no, really, they scored with no time on the clock — and, after forcing Chelsea into a three and out, blocked Roberts’ punt and recovered the ball for another touchdown.  Just like that, even faster than Chelsea had put up its 14-point lead, Pioneer had erased it, and the game was far too exciting again.

Pioneer’s surge didn’t last long, though; after a 43-yard Michael Lenneman kickoff return set up Chelsea near midfield, the Bulldogs leaned heavily on Hill’s shoulders — five out of six plays featured Hill — as they drove for a touchdown to retake the lead.  Pioneer went back to its punting ways, and Chelsea continued its scoring ways, this time with a 14-yard touchdown pass from Roberts to Lenneman; the Bulldogs’ lead was back to 14, but that whole 14-Purple-points-in-under-a-minute thing back there in that last paragraph didn’t make me confident that this lead would last much longer.  But it did last the final few minutes of the first half — Pioneer traveled into Chelsea territory but couldn’t score before the half ended — so that’s something, anyway.

Randy Cox, apparently delirious over Chelsea’s 14-point halftime lead, forgets that Joel Boyce is actually his teammate.  And that it’s still halftime.

Neither rain nor hail nor dark of night nor offensive linemen shall keep Kevin Rosentreter from the quarterback.

It didn’t take long for half the lead to disappear pretty quickly after halftime; Pioneer received the kickoff, and on first down, Furrha got all McNabby with a 71-yard touchdown run.  Chelsea made an effort to respond, but Roberts’ 37-yard field goal attempt fell short, and Chelsea’s lead was still only seven points.  The Pioneers really truly wanted to tie the score, but they soon had to punt the ball away; however, though the Bulldogs managed to drive inside the 20, they couldn’t extend their lead at all, and the Pioneers got another chance to tie the score.  This time, they succeeded … but then they failed.  That may sound confusing, but it’s really quite simple; they drove 88 yards for a touchdown, but they missed one important detail: the extra point.  The wayward kick kept Pioneer in a one-point hole, and with six minutes to go in the game, that little detail seemed maybe sort of kind of a little important.

Dakota Risner has plans for you, and they don’t involve Michael Roberts or the football.

Feel the love!  Also, the turf.

Still, as important as that detail may have been, it wasn’t a big enough to detail to give Chelsea much peace of mind; a one-point lead can disappear in a hurry, so to minimize the worry and maximize the peace of mind, the Bulldogs wanted to score, and they wanted to drain as much time as they could in the process.  How do you do that?  By running the ball!  And who had already carried the ball 34 times for over 250 yards?  Why, Nick Hill!  So, when Chelsea faced a key third and one, the coaches decided to give the ball to the ever-reliable Hill, and that decision worked out pretty well: instead of simply gaining the short yardage necessary for the first down, Hill responded with a remarkable 42-yard run that brought the Chelsea crowd to its feet.  Why was it remarkable?  Well, take a look:

Hill broke through the left side of the line…

…and absorbed a big hit.

But Hill’s feet weren’t planted when he was hit, and the hit was low enough that it only knocked his feet out from under him.

So Hill put his hand out to keep from going down, got his feet back on the ground…

…and took off running as the defense said, “Wait … what?”

That run got the Chelsea offense all excited, and several plays later, Hill finished the drive by taking the ball in from the four.  After Roberts made the extra point, Chelsea had a much more comforting eight-point lead with two minutes to go; that little detail of the missed extra point now loomed extra large and purply for the Pioneers: even if they scored a touchdown, they’d have to go for two just to tie the game.  For a while, it looked like Pioneer might have a chance to go for two; Furrha threw the ball all over the field and managed to get the Pioneers inside the 10 with just under a minute to go.  But a sack and two incomplete passes — the last on fourth down — ended Pioneer’s hopes of a comeback, and Chelsea had only to kneel down once to finalize a 35-27 victory.

All he said was, “If you want to go to Kilwin’s, raise your helmet!”

With a smile like that, you’d think he just set a school record in a hard-fought victory or something.

Leftovers:

• Remember that school record Hill set against Adrian?  It lasted all of one week.  Hill rushed 40 times for 340 yards and two touchdowns to surpass his previous record by 28 yards.  That brought his two-week total to 662 yards rushing and 6 touchdowns on 64 carries.
• Pioneer’s failure to score at the end of the first half was punctuated by a bizarre sequence of events.  Coming out of its last timeout with 19 seconds left, Pioneer faced a third and 5; Furrha was sacked, and with no way to stop the clock, Pioneer was forced to rush to the line to get off one more play before time expired.  One of the Chelsea linemen had lost his shoe on third down, and in the rush between plays, he had no time to put it back on; instead, he threw his shoe as far down the field as he could before the snap.  The sight of an object flying out of the line confused a lot of people, but the Pioneer center snapped the ball anyway; somewhere around the same time as the snap, somebody — presumably the referee — blew a whistle for some unknown reason.  At the sound of the whistle, everybody — including Furrha holding the ball in the backfield — stopped and looked at the referee.  Though everyone had heard a whistle, the referee yelled at the players to continue the play, and one of the Chelsea linemen obliged by tackling Furrha to end the play.  Understandably, the Pioneer coaches were miffed, but the play stood, and that’s how the half ended.
• The Bulldogs were very good on third downs against Pioneer, converting them 70% of the time (7 of 10).
• It seems the Pioneer press box staff wasn’t too fond of the final score; before I could get the usual shot of the scoreboard, they turned it off, so all I could get was a shot of the blank scoreboard.

Next week:
Chelsea faces the Indians of Tecumseh; the game is in Chelsea on Friday at 7:00.