Attitude Adjustment

Like a coy pool shark laying out his quarters, the Farmington Junior High football team has nearly run the table against 7A competition this season.

The latest victim was Rogers Heritage, whom the junior Cardinals upstaged, 24-21, Oct. 27 at Allen Holland Field. The War Eagles finished an eighth-grade game, which they won, 20-6, over a split Farmington eighth-grade squad, passing the football. After Farmington turned the ball over on downs inside the red zone with 48 seconds left, Heritage ended the game with three straight passes, despite owning a 14-point lead. With the clock counting down, they got off a snap with one second left and threw the ball deep. The pass was overthrown and the game ended on an incompletion, but the War Eagles were clearly trying to add to their point total.

The War Eagles seemed to project an "You're playing with the big boys (7A teams) now, live with it" attitude. They soon found out the junior high team Farmington sent out to play wasn't marching to that tune. Farmington freshmen and half a squad of eighth-graders, most who didn't play in the first game, may very well have grown up listening to the former Hank Williams Jr., "Are You Ready For Some Football?" classic in the days before Bocephus was deemed politically incorrect and kicked off Monday Night Football by network executives, who failed to appreciate freedom of speech. Another "Hank Junior" tune, as the artist is commonly known, "Attitude Adjustment" was exactly what the junior Cardinals had in mind to bring the inflated egos of their 7A counterparts back down to earth.

Farmington overcame an early 14-0 deficit. Farmington head junior high coach Tracy Sutton noted the junior Cardinals were off the previous week, saying, "I think the week off hurt us as far as game speed and getting in rhythm. You can't simulate games. When you don't get to play a game, it's a little different."

Farmington needed a big play and got one from freshman Drew Sturgeon with a 50-yard kick return setting up the junior Cardinal offense at the Heritage 22. Freshman Jaden Schaeder ran off right tackle 4 yards, then broke an 18-yard touchdown run on a sweep. Tate Sutton ran in the 2-point conversion on a quarterback keeper narrowing Heritage's lead to 14-8 at the 3:19 mark of the second period.

"Jaden Schaeder runs the football well," said coach Tracy Sutton. "Give him a crease, he can go. He's a good, physical back. I'm very proud of him. The offensive line, they opened some holes. They come to work every day."

Jacob Turner and Dakota Wolf made tackles, that combined with an incomplete pass, forced a Heritage punt from the War Eagle 35. Sturgeon again provided good field position with a quality punt return to Farmington's 48. Two plays later, he reeled in a pass from Tate Sutton and ran for a 47-yard touchdown. The pair hooked up on a 2-point pass conversion pushing Farmington in the lead, at 16-14, with 1:09 before halftime.

Farmington led, 24-14, with 2:52 remaining in the third when Tate Sutton threw to Sturgeon for a 15-yard touchdown pass play, then replicated the scoring feat for another successful 2-point conversion. Although Heritage would pull within 24-21, they couldn't catch up. With the junior Cardinal band striking up a lively tune, the musical soundtrack took over. One could almost hear Farmington assistant coach Steve Morgan backed by the Southwinds band narrate the final seconds of the game in classic Bocephus-style.

"...Farmington coaches called for their defense to rein Heritage in. The War Eagle quarterback thought, 'You're never going to do it, friend,' and uttered an adjustment at the top of his lungs; but after spiking the pigskin into one of his own linemen and throwing an interception to Farmington's Evan Shoffitt, he could not wait to get off that field...This was an attitude adjustment, losing to a 5A team, guess this was his first time. This was an attitude adjustment, now the War Eagles are going to run wind sprints all the time..."

The victory was the third over area 7A teams for the junior Cardinals, who improved their season record at 4-3 after a rough start to the season, losing to Prairie Grove, Pea Ridge and Fayetteville White in September before defeating Springdale Lakeside and Springdale Southwest in October.