The evening started with clear skies and smiling faces who packed Bruin Stadium for Homecoming festivities at Orangeburg-Wilkinson High School.

It ended with rainfall pouring on the downtrodden faces of the Bruin players following a 24-22 loss to North Augusta.

For the second straight week, O-W (5-3, 1-3) had no answer for the opposition’s feature back. This week it was Tidy Johnson who bullied his way for 180 yards and two touchdowns, including the game-winner with 6:29 left.

The Bruins, who rallied from a 10-point first-half deficit only to squander a similar margin in the second half, had two opportunities in the fourth quarter to reclaim the lead. However, quarterback Jayson Leverett was picked off twice in the final minutes to preserve the win for the Yellow Jackets (6-2, 3-1).

A pair of failed conversions also came back to haunt O-W, one of numerous mistakes which left head coach Tommy Brown scratching his head in frustration.

“The little things, I keep going back to the little things,” he said. “A bad snap which shouldn’t have been. We work on that everyday, but when you get in game time, what can you say. You don’t make the play, that’s what is going to happen.”

Controlling the clock with the ground game and timely completions to keep the chains moving, North Augusta dominated the first quarter in jumping out to a 10-0 advantage. The Yellow Jackets held the football for a combined 29 plays and 13 minutes and 46 seconds on their first two drives, which ended with a 1-yard touchdown run by Johnson in the first quarter and a 30-yard field goal by Stephen Stuberfield.

“I think controlling the clock is the best defense,” North Augusta head coach Dan Pippin. “Orangeburg has a great offense. We didn’t need to have them on the field a whole bunch. So controlling the clock was a key thing tonight.”

While North Augusta racked up 193 total yards in the first half, O-W’s offense could barely muster 30 yards on its two brief possession in the first half. It all changed with 1:56 remaining when Leverett found his rhythm and orchestrated a nine-play, 89-yard scoring drive. It started with two completions of 26 and 28 yards to Raheem Howell and a 24-yard strike to Roy Haynes to bring the Bruins into the ‘Red Zone’.

After Leverett hit Clayton Gidron on a 14-yard slant, the duo hooked up again for a 5-yard touchdown pass play with 24 seconds left in the second quarter. An errant snap to the holder resulted in O-W failing to attempt the PAT, leaving North Augusta on top 10-6 entering the lockerroom.

Halftime witnessed O-W’s Alexis Backmon crowned as “Miss Homecoming 2008.” The first-half momentum carried over for the Bruins as Leverett threw two touchdowns in the first two minutes.

On the second play of the third quarter, Leverett found Howell downfield for a 72-yard touchdown pass play. The duo hooked up again for the two-point conversion to put O-W up 14-10 with 11:09 left in the third quarter.

Seconds later, O-W linebacker Travis Fox recovered a North Augusta fumble at the 16-yard line. The very next play, Leverett floated a high pass towards an open Gidron in the end zone to extend O-W’s lead to 20-10 at the 10:10 mark of the third quarter.

“That was kind of something,” Pippen said. “There was nothing you can do. Those were two big plays.”

Leverett finished 12 of 21 passing for 228 yards and two touchdowns.

North Augusta responded with another time-consuming drive dominated by the running of Johnson. His 41-yard scamper on the Yellow Jackets’ next series set up a 2-yard touchdown run by quarterback Travis Murphy to cut the Bruins’ lead to 20-17.

The fourth quarter belonged to Johnson as he singlehandedly rumbled through the Bruin defense for 61 of the 70 yards on the nine-play scoring drive he capped by rushing untouched across the goal line. .

“When you’ve got like Tidy Johnson, our kids just stepped up,” Pippin said. “I thought our offensive line played well. Last week, we did the same thing against Irmo. We controlled the clock. We just didn’t score. Tonight we scored which for us was a big deal.”

O-W looked to respond as it moved the football to the North Augusta 34. With 2:29 remaining, Leverett rolled out of the pocket and tried to fire a long pass in the end zone towards a Bruin receiver.

Instead, a hustling Cam Alston deflected the pass into the air and teammate Dante Coleman caught the football in the end zone. He returned the football into Bruin territory, only to have it returned to the North Augusta 5 because of an illegal block.

Forced to punt from its own end zone, North Augusta opted to take the safety with 38 seconds left. O-W returned the football to the Yellow Jacket 45 following the free kick, but Leverett’s pass was intercepted by North Augusta’s Matt Hazel with 31 seconds left.

“They did a great job executing when they had to,” Brown said. “They made the plays that we didn’t make. We’re working hard and the kids are making progress, but we still have to learn how to win. We’ve been done so long, but we still don’t know how to win yet and that’s a factor. We’ve been blessed to get this far, but not knowing how to win when you get in tough situations, it becomes hard. You can’t teach it. You have to learn through experience.”

Up next for the Bruins is a home game against nemesis Aiken, while North Augusta plays host to Richland Northeast.

n T&D Senior Sports Writer Thomas Grant Jr. can be reached by e-mail at tgrant@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-533-5547. Discuss this and other stories on-line at TheTandD.com.

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