Twenty-five thousand fans packed Kyle Field in College Station Saturday night to see one of the best 4A games of the year, as the Port Neches-Groves Indians outlasted the Samuel Clemens Buffaloes, 16-13.

But it was coach Robert Lehnhoff’s Buffs (14-1) that looked to be headed into next week’s state final. With a 13-9 lead, the Buffs mounted an incredible 19-play, 10:46 drive that ate up the end of the third quarter and most of the fourth. The Buffs drove to the Indian 21 yard line, only to see a 38-yard field goal attempt fly wide left with 4:29 remaining in the game.

The Buff defense held PN-G (15-0) to only nine points — all coming in the first quarter, and all well under PN-G’s season average. But with the game on the line, PN-G began a march toward the goal line that would give their tribe life for at least one more week. Indian quarterback Dustin Long began the drive simply enough with a 7-yard completion to his fullback, but then heated up and rarely missed.

“We told ourselves that if we could get the ball back, we were not going to be stopped,” said Long. “Our defense did a great job of sticking together and showing a lot of heart out there.”

After a 21-yard completion down to the Buff 23, fullback Bo Wortham scampered 20 yards down the Clemens sideline to the 1 yard line, where Long plunged over the right side of the offensive line for a score. With the extra point, the score stood firmly at 16-13, a score that never changed, as the Indians rode the wave of emotions to the victory, setting up next week’s 4A Division II state championship against two-time defending champions Stephenville in Houston’s Astrodome. Stephenville outlasted Ennis, 34-3, in Irving.

“This is the greatest feeling I have ever had in my whole life,” said Wortham. “We’ve been wishing for this since the beginning of the season, and we worked our hardest for this one tonight.”

PN-G looked to have a handle on the game early on. Already leading 6-0, the Indians marched 42 yards to the Clemens nine yard line behind the tough running of Wortham, who had 30 yards on 5 carries during the drive. A third-down pass at the Buff 9 fell incomplete, though, and the Indians settled for the 26-yard field goal and a 9-0 lead.

From that point, 1:59 left in the first quarter, however, the Clemens offense took over the game. Clemens’ grinding, time-consuming running game slowly wore down the Indian defense. Fullback Patrick Jackson and tailback Damien Pinkerton were the inside and outside punches of the Buff offense; they dominated
time of possession during most of the drive.

After the Indian field goal dropped them nine points in the hole, the Buffs stormed back behind four Jackson runs, and six Pinkerton carries, as they chewed up 69 yards in nine plays. A 12-yard touchdown run by Pinkerton capped the drive. The extra point bounced off the upright, and the score at the half was 9-6 in favor of the Indians.

The Buffaloes stampeded out of the halftime break, and after holding the PN-G offense to a three-and-out on their first possession, wasted little time in scoring the go-ahead touchdown. Two 1-yard runs by Jackson and Pinkerton left the Buffs with a third and 8 at their own 47 yard line, but quarterback Scott Hall dropped back and found a wide-open K. R. Carpenter for a 53-yard touchdown. The extra point was good, and Clemens looked to be well on the way to a victory with a 13-9 lead.

“They’re a great offensive team,” said PN-G head coach Matt Burnett. “We just hung in there on defense. They tested us again and again, but we held, and that last drive by us was a thing of beauty. All I can say is that we’re going to the big show baby!”