LITTLE ROCK – Jonas Elms proved a handful for Woodlawn to bring down.
Elms scored eight touchdowns – six running and two passing – in leading Cedar Ridge to a 74-38 victory over Woodlawn for the state high school eight-man football championship at War Memorial Stadium. Elms tallied 279 yards rushing and 128 yards on 7-of-8 passing on his way to most valuable player honors following a 3-hour, 17-minute contest.
That energy, interestingly enough, comes from the Timberwolves’ defense, Elms said.
“We just go off each other’s energy,” he explained. “Our defense was high-energy, and our offense just kept it rolling the entire game.”
Elms finished his senior season with 3,368 yards of total offense. He had touchdown runs of 23, 1, 2, 33, 34 and 57 yards and touchdown passes of 47 yards (to Cash Martin) and 11 (to Austin Pautsch).
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Woodlawn (10-1) was going for its first sanctioned football title in Doug Means’ first season as head coach, seven years after winning a club state title. This was the fifth year the Arkansas Activities Association held a playoff for eight-man teams.
“These kids played their hearts out all year,” Means said. “They played better than most people thought they were going to play. They did everything I asked them to do throughout the year. And the things that we did right in the season didn’t go right tonight.”
Cedar Ridge outgained Woodlawn 540-446 in total yards. Three turnovers, one of them a 59-yard interception return by junior Colby Fears in the fourth quarter, hindered the Bears’ chances.
Elms ran for three touchdowns and threw for another in the first half, leading Cedar Ridge (11-1) to a 26-8 halftime lead. He ran for touchdowns on the Timberwolves’ first two drives, both beginning on the Bears’ side of the field.
Woodlawn fell behind 20-0 after senior Martin took a screen pass from Elms and turned it into a 47-yard touchdown pass with 1:58 left in the opening quarter. By that point, the Bears had experienced their largest deficit of the season.
Usually a high-octane offense, Woodlawn turned the ball over on downs on its first two drives before finally getting on the board at the end of the period. A 15-yard penalty against Cedar Ridge moved the ball to the Wolves’ 31, and junior Ethan Saeler turned in a 29-yard carry that set up classmate Ace Culliford’s 2-yard scoring run.
Saeler carries 21 times for 140 yards and two touchdowns and completed 9 of 22 passes for 153 yards and two more scores. Culliford ran 10 times for 79 yards.
Hobbling after losing a fumble in the second quarter, Saeler engineered a 10-play, 56-yard scoring drive on the opening possession of the second half. He helped Woodlawn get to the 4 before he was forced out of bounds on a 6-yard loss, then threw incomplete to senior tight end Beau Watson on third-and-goal. Saeler went right back to Watson on the left side and floated a 10-yard TD pass to him on fourth-and-goal, then kept the ball for the extra two to pull the Bears within 26-16 with 9:12 left in the third quarter.
Martin was stopped for a 2-yard loss on Cedar Ridge’s next play from scrimmage, but he cashed in the play after that with a 55-yard sprint. That was part of a 28-22 third quarter in the Wolves’ favor that saw Pautsch, Elms and Bradley Pankey (30-yard rush) add to their scoring column.
Senior Matthew Green, who caught five passes for 125 yards and a TD, narrowed the Woodlawn deficit to 48-30 at one point with a 69-yard catch from Saeler.
Saeler ran for his second touchdown from 5 yards out with 10:16 left in the game to draw Woodlawn within 54-38. Needing a stop on fourth-and-9 on the Wolves’ next drive, the Bears instead drew a pass interference penalty to move the ball to the Woodlawn 35. The very next play, Elms ran the 35 yards to make it a three-possession game with 8:34 remaining.
“I’m not surprised at anything our guys can do, especially when it comes to size,” Cedar Ridge Coach Scott Morgan said, his team smaller than Woodlawn on the offensive and defensive lines . “We’ve been outsized all year long. We play with 160-pound linemen, but we get in there. We’re tough. We’re gritty. We going to fight, and we’re not going to give up.”
Sophomore Griffin Manes intercepted a pass for Woodlawn in the second quarter and returned it 28 yards.
The Bears settled for a season-low in points. The previous season high for points by a Woodlawn opponent was 56 by Dermott on Oct. 17. Woodlawn won that game by 20 points.
But Cedar Ridge proved a different beast.
“We just didn’t do a great job of tackling,” Means said. “(Cedar Ridge has) a great team. They have a great scheme, but we didn’t play very well on defense or offense, so we just didn’t play a very good tackling game. If you don’t tackle in football, it’s hard to win.”
