Golden Bears rush for nearly 400 yards advance to semifinals

Mt. Juliet goes to Memphis on Black Friday

By Jeff Neal

Correspondent

BRENTWOOD – The Mount Juliet Golden Bears (12-1) rushed for nearly 400 yards and advanced to the semifinals for the second straight

year with a 31-20 win over Brentwood Friday night.

"Our offensive line did a good job of blocking. (Contrez) McCathern was a workhorse, as all our backs were tonight." Mt Juliet coach Roger

Perry said after his Golden Bears ousted Brentwood from the Class 6A quarterfinals for the second straight season. "I am extremely proud of our coaching staff and our young men for what they did tonight,"

McCathern finished with 35 carries for 238 yards and a touchdown. Ben Cheatham added eight carries for 98 yards. Caleb Hopkins had six carries for 21 yards and two touchdowns.

As a team, the Golden Bears rushed 57 times for 396 yards and four touchdowns.

The scoring began late in the first quarter. On Mt. Juliet's opening possession, the Bears went for it on fourth and two at the 29-yard line. The attempt failed and Brentwood got the ball back, but failed to do anything with it and was forced to punt.

The Golden Bears broke the ice with an eight-play, 48-yard drive that ended in a field goal of 48 yards by Ryan Jenkins, giving them a 3-0 lead.

Brentwood got an excellent scoring chance on the ensuing kickoff with a huge return inside the Golden Bear 20-yard line. The Bruins drove the ball to the 4-yard line and had first and goal. After three running plays, Brentwood called timeout to discuss the next move. Coach Mark Pemberton decided to go for it on fourth down from the 1-yard line. The Mt Juliet defense stiffened and held, taking over on the Bears' 5-yard line.

Mt Juliet proceeded to take the ball the length of the field on an 11-play, 95-yard drive, capping it with a 6-yard run from Caleb Hopkins, the

first of his two scores on the night. The key plays in the drive were runs from McCathern of 19 and 39 yards.

Before the end of the half, Mt Juliet scored again on another Hopkins run, this one of 5 yards, to make the score at halftime 17-0 Golden Bears.

Brentwood took its first possession of the second half and scored on a nine-play, 81-yard drive, capping it with a 5-yard run by Ben Green.

The Golden Bears went on another long scoring drive, this one 16 plays and 80 yards, capping it with a 10-yard run by Ben Cheatham. McCathern on the drive ran the ball 12 times for 53 yards.

Late in the ballgame, Mt Juliet scored one more time on a 13-yard run by McCathern.

Brentwood scored twice in the last two and a half minutes.

The first score came on a pass from Austin Winfree to Green.

The second score came on the final play of the game as David Meehan recovered a fumble and took it in the end zone for the final score of the game as Brentwood put a wrap on an 11-2 season

Mt Juliet will travel to Memphis next Friday to take on Whitehaven in the semifinals. The Black Friday kickoff will be at 7 p.m. The Tigers crushed Germantown 52-7 last night in the quarterfinal round.

"We are looking at it as a rematch. We know we are the underdog and we are going to leave it all on the field," said McCathern, whose Bears lost 44-10 to the Tigers at Mt. Juliet last Black Friday.

"They are a tremendous team and they have most of their team back from last year," Perry said. "They embarrassed us last year so hopefully we can make it more respectable." Perry said.