This chiller was a thriller that warmed the heart of many a Mexico High School football fan. No doubt about it.
And guess what? The second season of the Devin Brown era could get even more interesting, and fast.
As a result of their first post-season victory since 1995, the Bulldogs made a little history on a crisp and cool Wednesday night at Hawthorne Heights, playing inspired football to beat the Sullivan Eagles 7-0 and draw a familiar foe for Monday's 7 p.m. sectional contest, also at home.
NCMC rival Fulton will be coming to town for the second time this fall, thanks to a 14-13 victory at Salem, the District 7 champion in Class 3. The winner of that rematch will advance to the Nov. 14 state quarterfinals against either Trinity Catholic or Bowling Green.
“I told the kids Fulton week has come back around early,” Brown said this morning.
Mexico took the measure of the Hornets 14-6 last month to snap a five-game losing streak and begin a 3-0 run to the District 8 championship. Now the Highway 54 Bowl neighbors have even more at stake when they line up against each other.
Neither Fulton nor Mexico ended the regular season with winning records, but you can toss that bit of trivia out the window. For the record, though, the Bulldogs now stand at 5-6, surpassing the win total they posted in Brown's first year as head coach; the Hornets sport a 6-5 mark after having beaten Salem for the second year in a row to start the MSHSAA's expanded football playoff system.
Returning to action in weather that seemed almost ideal by comparison with their recent mud bowl against North Callaway, Mexico lost fumbles on each of its first two possessions against Sullivan, which defeated the Bulldogs 28-0 when the teams met for the first time ever last year.
Both squads had decidedly different looks this time around, making this year's meeting more of an unknown quantity even with the return of Sullivan running back Chris Frye, the Eagles' all-time rushing leader. With defensive efforts that kept the small but shifty runner from breaking off the big play, the Bulldogs overcame their early turnovers to go 65 yards on eight plays in the second quarter for the game's only touchdown.
Starting at its own 35-yard line, Mexico called running back Haylon Jacobs' number four times and quarterback Kurt Loyd's number twice before Jermaine Thompson touched the ball for just the second time, bouncing off tacklers to go 29 yards down to the Sullivan 8-yard line.
On the next snap, Jacobs made the most of a big hole up the middle, shedding would-be tacklers and diving into the end zone. Austin Reed followed with a successful PAT, making it 7-0 with 7:06 remaining in the first half.
Given a lead to protect, Mexico defenders rose to the occasion as Shia Miller picked off a third-down pass on the next Sullivan series. The Eagles got the ball back five plays later, but the Bulldogs forced them to punt and got  the ball back at the Mexico 45.
Scoring the first touchdown of a game obviously is a great momentum-builder; sometimes, though, the outcome hinges on who scores the second – will the contest go back and forth or will one team take the lead and add to it?
The Bulldogs appeared ready to double their advantage in the closing minutes before intermission. Cheered on by a vocal home crowd eager for more points, Mexico saw Loyd complete a pair of passes to Toby Bract to reach the Sullivan 8 with 26.5 seconds on the clock. But an illegal block nullfied Loyd’s scrambling dash into the end zone and put them back at the Eagles' 20. Little did anybody know they had seen all the scoring there would be.
That didn't make the second half any less exciting, however. The teams traded punches to no avail in the third period, then had fans of both teams on the edge of their seats almost until time ran out.
Starting at their own 10-yard line just 13 seconds into the fourth quarter, the Eagles staged their deepest foray into Mexico territory with a pair of first-down runs by Frye moving them to the Mexico 6.
But on a third-and-8 call, the Sullivan quarterback floated a short pass across the goal line, only to see Bulldog defender Toby Bracht step in front of the intended receiver and make a juggling interception, returning the ball to the Mexico 14.
The Bulldogs failed to get any thing going offensively as a result of that turnover, but Miller gave them another chance to run out the clock when he picked off Sullivan's next play. Mexico then used up more than four minutes, only to stall out at the Eagles' 19 with 2:07 left to play.
The Eagles got two first downs before Tyus Williams sacked John Koppelman quarterback on fourth-and-10 with 40.5 seconds remaining. Taking over at the Sullivan 27, all Mexico had to do to keep what’s turning out to be a magical season alive was to maintain possession and run out the clock and that it did with Loyd twice taking the snap and putting his knee to the ground.
Then came more cheering, the celebrating and the congratulations, which included a happy on-field reunion of Brown and his father, Gene.
“Both offenses were a little shaky at times, but this was a game between two good defensive football teams,” the MHS coach said. “The key for us was staying positive after those two early turnovers. We made some mistakes, but unlike earlier in the season we didn’t let them beat us.”
Mexico’s defense kept Frye in check, holding him to an unofficial 22 carries for 86 yards. Jacobs led the Bulldogs with 61 yards on 23 carries, while Loyd added 41 on 15 and Thompson 37 on four.
Fulton, meanwhile, blocked an extra point to preserve its one-point lead at the end of the third quarter, then blocked Salem’s 14-yard field-goal attempt with three seconds to go to clinch its triumph. The Tigers led 7-6 at halftime.
Antawan Ferguson topped the Hornets on offense with 125 yards rushing. He scored on Fulton’s first possession of the game from four yards out.