St. Paul’s survives overtime thriller with Mandeville

It is a great rivalry with many storied games to remember.

That list grew Friday night.

St. Paul’s staged a late rally to force overtime and then survived a 2-point conversion attempt in the extra period to edge Mandeville 21-20 at Hunter Stadium in a key District 6-5A matchup.

The win was the sixth straight for St. Paul’s (6-1, 5-0).

Trailing 14-7, the Wolves got the key drive they needed, capping it off on a 7-yard touchdown pass from Grant Billson to Preston Hickey with 46 seconds remaining in the game.

In overtime, St. Paul’s got the ball first and Ben Knobloch scored on a 6-yard run to make it 21-14.

The Skippers answered with a 1-yard run by Douglas McGowan to make it 21-20.

On the road, Hutch Gonzales elected to go for the win.

Rex Henderson rolled left and under pressure, threw to the back of the end zone into a host of players from both teams. The pass fell incomplete and St. Paul’s secured a huge victory.

The game was scoreless at the half.

St. Paul’s finally got on the board to take the lead, completing a nice drive with a 3-yard touchdown run by Knobloch to lead 7-0 with 4:29 to play in the third quarter.

Mandeville then seemed to take control.

Henderson connected with Miami commit Landon Ibieta on a 55-yard touchdown pass to tie the game 7-7 with 2:51 to play in the third quarter.

Then, Henderson connected with Ibieta again, this time for 32 yards, to set up a 4-yard touchdown pass from Henderson to Alex McQueen to give the Skippers a 14-7 lead with 6:29 to play in the game, setting the stage for the exciting finish.

Speaking on the 3 Tailgaters Show on NASH ICON 106.1 FM Saturday morning, St. Paul’s coach Ken Sears was not surprised that Mandeville went for the win in overtime.

“I thought Coach Gonzales made the right call to go for two,” Sears said. “If we were playing at their place, I probably would have done the same thing. Extra points are not automatic. We were fortunate to get a little pressure, getting a good jump off the ball and covered up their tight end and had good coverage on the play and got a hand on it.”

Sears knew the game was going to go down to the wire.

“They are always great games with Mandeville,” Sears said. “Both teams played very hard and I am very proud of our team. We tried to press the running game early but Mandeville had an answer for everything we did. We made adjustments at half and had some success but they did as well and were successful in the second half. Both defenses were on the field for a long time and wore down a bit.”

Knobloch finished with 21 carries for 106 yards and two scores for the Wolves. Ibieta finished with four catches for 103 yards and a touchdown for the Skippers.

Now, the challenge grows far greater as St. Paul’s travels to “The Swamp” next Friday for a showdown with unbeaten Ponchatoula with the District 6-5A championship on the line.

“They have an outstanding football team,” Sears said. “They are putting up a lot of points and playing great defense. We need to put a good game plan together this week. They are multi-dimensional on offense and have really improved on defense. They do little things well. There’s no question they are well coached.”