Basile leans on defense to down Montgomery in Class 1A regional round, 14-8

BASILE-The Basile Bearcats advanced to the quarterfinals after defeating Montgomery in a 14-8 slugfest in the regional round of the Class 1A playoffs Friday night.

“It was a struggle,” said Basile head coach Kevin Bertrand. “It was a battle the whole way through. Our defense played outstanding the whole game.”

After the first quarter ended in a 0-0 defensive stalemate, the initial score of the game came on a defensive touchdown for Basile when a bad snap was picked up in the end zone by Cameron Berzas to give Basile a 6-0 lead.

Montgomery answered right back, driving down the field before a touchdown run by quarterback Logan Graves to give the Tigers a 8-6 lead at halftime.

Basile started the third quarter with what seemed to be a long touchdown pass from Dawson Ashford to Andre Reed but a penalty nullified the score. However, the Bearcats managed to put together a long drive capped by a one-yard touchdown run by Reed that ended up as the game winner.

The Bearcat defense held out for the entire fourth quarter to seal the victory and a trip to the quarterfinals.

“I thought we came in with a good game plan,” said Montgomery head coach Brian Williams. “Our defense played extremely well all night. We did some stuff in the first half that shot us in the foot and had some miscues that we couldn’t rebound from.”

With the win over Montgomery, Basile has won seven straight games since starting out the season 1-3.

“It’s a credit to the team,” said Bertrand. “They never, ever believed at any point that we were going to have a bad season. Our theme all season has been work hard and get better every week and they really bought into it. At 1-3 most teams would panic but ours didn’t.”

Basile, now 9-3, will head on the road next week to take on No. 2 seed Oak Grove Tigers (11-1). Montgomery finishes the season at 7-5.