After a little preliminary sparring in which the adversaries sort of felt each other out and left the impression that maybe neither defense was going to let anybody go anywhere all night, the Wolves took a punt on their own 15 and built a fire under their offense. Ray Chancelor, who played one of the slickest defensive games this writer has seen in 30 years of watching high school football, took the kick on the 15 and returned it to the 24.
Bob Abney, ignoring the steady downpour which never quit throughout the game, pitched out to Larry Shoemaker, ran some keepers himself, handed off to Billy Coley and on a neat mixture of plays bored through holes dug in the Rebel defense by those magnificent blockers up front, move date ball to the enemy 48 as the quarter ended.
Gains ranging from Abney's own 11-yard sweep of right end down to some 1- and 2-yard gains through the middle in the mud where the going was rough, moved the Lobos inexorably downfield, and at the Rebel 14 they got a lift from a holding penalty against the visitors which moved it to the 8.
Then came that play.
Abney pitched out to Coley and the fleet little 147-pounder headed around his own right end. Some fine blocking got him into the secondary and he made his turn, heading for the flag. Just shy of the goal line, a defender made a pass at him but he lunged past him into what must be called pay mud.
Abney fired a rocket into Pete Mobbs ribs for the extra two points and, although he was standing in the end when he caught it, Mobbs wriggled away from a tackle, came back across the line and spun back across for the 8-0 lead.
Anybody who thought the game was over then was plain nuts. After the scoring was over it really got good.
George Seay, a great halfback and a pretty fair county quarterback as well, handled the throttle on a drive late in the second quarter that looked as though the Rebels might tie the score, but it bogged down. It was at that point that the Lobo line got the first of its two acid tests and it made a big fat A-plus on both of them.
After the Lobo score the Rebs took the kickoff and moved all the way to the Lobo 19, with Seay throwing a 20-yard pass and a 21-yarder to Tom Bailey as the key plays.
In a 4th-down-and-4 situation Steay heaved one into the end zone that Billy Coley intercepted and instead of grounding it for a touchback, Coley elected to run it out. He was racked up on the one.
The Lobo line, however, knocked down some people while Bruner moved the ball to the 6 in two plays but an offside penalty put it back on the 1. The big line held out the boys in blue, though, while Abney kicked out of danger from deep in the end zone.
Late in the fourth quarter a bad pass from center on a third down ice put the Wolves in another hole on their own 8. With a 4th-down-and-36 setup, Abney kicked to Seay on the Lobo 44 and he fumbled when he was nailed. Donnie Huffman recovered for the Wolves, and they had things under control the rest of the way.
Andy Malone, Jerry Earnhardt, Danny Fields, Huffman, Hogan, the ailing Larry Boswell, Mike Clark - about anybody you name who played on the line looked like a million dollars at the 15 per cent interest. The Rebs gained 0 yards rushing and lost 31 for a net of 19. Seay looked great at times, however, flipping a slippery ball to some equally slippery receivers; but in the end the lines spelled the difference. Seay wasn't going anywhere last night.
Seay, who alternated at half and quarter with Tom Bailey, completed four passes for 57 yards, but from scrimmage he had a bad time. He had a net loss of 13 yards as the Lobo forwards stayed in his lane all night.
