Greenwood saw its hopes of going into halftime tied with Class 5A No. 6 Martinsville halted on fourth-and-goal with less than a second left in the second quarter Friday night.
“We gave ourselves a chance to be tied and just couldn’t punch it in from the 1-yard line,” Greenwood coach Mike Campbell said.
On fourth-and-goal from the 1 with no timeouts, Woodmen junior quarterback Oliver Rau was stopped just short of the goal line with 0.8 seconds left. That was all the momentum Martinsville needed, dominating the second half en route to a 29-8 victory.
Senior running back Isaac Osborne rushed 16 times for 171 yards, including two touchdowns, to lead the Artesians.
“We have to keep improving, keep playing downhill,” said Campbell, whose team fell to 1-2. “We just need to do things to put ourselves in position to finish some plays.”
Osborne scored from 41 yards out and then added a two-point conversion run to give Martinsville (3-0) an 8-0 lead in the first quarter.
Greenwood senior running back Nick Willham, who had 63 yards on 20 carries, scored on a 11-yard touchdown later in the opening quarter. Rau then connected with Dylan Wheatley for a two-point conversion pass to tie it.
The Artesians took the lead for good on senior quarterback Travis Griffey’s 1-yard TD run in the second quarter. Griffey finished with 56 rushing yards on 11 carries and 60 passing yards.
The Woodmen controlled the football much of the second quarter, but couldn’t capitalize.
“Especially in the first half, our kids executed what we want to do and how we wanted to play,” Campbell said. “We frustrated them. We did what we wanted to do to have a chance in the football game. We just have to be more consistent. That’s what we talked about after the game. We do some nice things. We just don’t do them consistently enough.”
Martinsville took a 22-8 lead on Griffey’s 25-yard pass to a wide-open to Matt Thomas with 2:11 left in the third quarter. Osborne’s 28-yard TD run in the fourth gave the Artesians a bigger cushion.
One positive for Greenwood was that it committed just three penalties compared to 14 for Martinsville. Three times the Woodmen were able to draw the Artesians offsides, twice for first downs in the opening half.
“They want to press and play tempo and we were very content to let them play tempo to our advantage,” Campbell said.
Rau completed 13 of 25 passes for 115 yards with one interception.
“We’re still a work in progress,” Campbell said. “We’re going to find those things we have to be consistent on. We’ll watch film (today), have a great week of practice and then get ready for a very good Mooresville team we’re playing next Friday. Overall, there are things we can build on.”
