MANDARIN – A missed extra point by Mandarin High in the flag football district 1-2A championship game proved fruitful to the Fleming Island High Golden Eagles who held to a 14-13 win to advance to the region semifinals on Fri., May 12 against Deland High at Spec Martin Stadium in Deland.

The winners of the Deland vs. Fleming Island semifinal will match up against the winner of Dr. Phillips of Orlando vs. Martin County of Stuart in the region final set for Tues., May 16 with a state semifinal on Fri., May 19 and the state championship on May 20.

“We have great athletes and they are super smart; what could be the best players we ever had in the school,” said Fleming Island coach Roger Dailey. “But they were making freshman type of mistakes all along the way.”

After dispensing with the Robert E. Lee High Generals 7-0 in the first of two semifinals for the night, the Golden Eagles had to wait out and scout Mandarin as they played the Sandalwood Saints. The Mandarin Mustangs would move on and face Fleming Island for the title game.

In their championship match, Fleming Island got ahead early, but Mandarin came back, then missed a point after attempt that would end up being the difference in the end as Fleming went on to win 14-13.

In Game one against the Lee Generals, Fleming scored a first quarter touchdown with a fake pass and run in by Hope Rozier, who also scored the point after. The team then relied on its defense to coast into the Mandarin game.

Going into the Mandarin game, Fleming seemed to get their game going early. On the initial drive, Mandarin got one first down before kicking the ball away for Fleming Island’s opening offensive drive. The combination of Liz Labas to Aubrey Burke and Hope Rozier worked the ball right down the field. With first and goal, Labas shovel passed to Malory Sinsel, who shoveled it back to Labas, who found Hope Rozier wide open in the end zone for the Golden Eagle’s first score. With the good single point after attempt, Fleming was up 7-0 with 4:30 left in the first quarter. Mandarin didn’t take it laying down, and drove right back with some deep passes to score with 8:35 left in the half. The point after attempt was broken up by a very alert Fleming Island defense.

“The defense has carried us all year long,” said Dailey. “That’s where year in and year out, our mentality’s been. I think a lot of people around the state, because we’ve had success, think we’re an offensive team. We have an unusual offense, but we’re always defensive minded. We choose defense first, to kind of hang our hat on that mentality.”

On the subsequent drive, Fleming was moving the ball when a pass and pitch went wrong and ended up in the arms of a Mandarin player who ran the ball back for a Mandarin score. The point after was good and Fleming found themselves down 13-7 in the second quarter.

To start the third quarter, Fleming Island uncharacteristically deferred the winning coin toss to go on offense to start the third quarter.

“You know this is the first time in two years that I chose to go on offense at the beginning of the second half,” said Dailey. “I always choose defense which always kind of makes people laugh. I said we’re going to try to take it to them and the first play is an interception.”

The picked off pass gave Mandarin excellent field position. The Golden Eagle defense was no match for the Mustangs as they turned the ball back over to Fleming on downs. Fleming Island was working the ball well with several deep balls from Labas to Rozier. On fourth down and going for it, Fleming again threw an interception. Once again, the Fleming Island defense held their ground and forced the Mustangs to punt. This drive saw Patel run and Bilyeu catch a deep slant route pass. The final exchange of the drive was another Labas – Rozier combination for the tying score. On the single point after attempt, Labas went to Rozier again, but this time she planned a lateral to Malory Sinsel for the go ahead score. The game would now fall on the backs of the Golden Eagle defense as they would leave Mandarin plenty of time to drive and score. As the drive wore on, Mandarin started burning time outs to save time, using all three, back-to-back.

When the defense once again did their job, Fleming took the ball back with around 1:20 left in the game. Coach Dailey called a time out and shared his plan. Nice short snap, stand still, and wait for Mandarin to run in and pull a flag. Without any timeouts left, all the Mustangs could do was watch in frustration as Fleming Island snapped the ball three times and stood there motionless and wasted the clock down to zero.

Asked about going into the playoffs, does he change anything up, Dailey told me “No because we’ll play a team that hasn’t seen us before. These teams like Mandarin or Orange Park that see us all the time, they have an idea what we do. We have such an unorthodox approach offensively and we’re very difficult to defend if you haven’t seen us on tape. Hopefully we pick up a team that has no idea what they’re in for and I think defensively we can probably play with; and slow down any attack we face.”