Silo: 'Late hit, unnecessary roughness, half a dozen personal fouls, take your pick Buck. They could've flagged us on every play.' Ronnie: 'Silo was biting people.'
Third and four, under two minutes.East Pike stalling as much as they can as the clock ticks away. Back at the line all eleven Spartans are waiting. Do you run and get stuffed, or do you pass and get sacked? That's the choice for East Pike. They cannot move the ball! Waddell is back, it's a screen, and the ballis knocked down by Donnie Utley! Clock stops! Fourth and four! East Pike will have to punt! One minute fifty seconds to play and the Spartans will get the ball!
Mal was walking slowly around the track, with another cigarette. They watched him get nearer.
Paul: 'The last punt return worked, so we decided to try it again.'
A low punt, a line drive that hits on the forty, takes a big bounce and then another, Alonzo Taylor scoops it at the thirty-five and he has nowhere to go! Flags everywhere! Could be a clip!
Paul: 'Could be? Hindu drilled a guy dead in the back, the worst clip I've ever seen.'
Silo: 'I started to break his neck.'
Neely: 'I stopped you, remember? Poor guy came to the sideline crying.'
Silo: 'Poor guy. If I saw him now I'd remind him of that clip.'
And so it comes down to this, folks. The Spartans have the ball on their own nineteen, eighty-one yards to go, with one minute and forty seconds left on the clock.Down thirty-one to twenty-eight. Crenshaw has two time-outs and no passing game.
Paul: 'Couldn't pass with a broken hand.'
The entire Spartan team is huddled together on the sideline and it looks like they're having a prayer.
Mal was walking up the steps, slowly, with none of his customary purpose and banter. Nat stopped the tape, and the bleachers were still.
'Boys,' Mal said softly, 'Coach is gone.'
Rabbit materialized from the shadows and loped down the track. They watched as he disappeared behind the Scoreboard, and a few seconds later the bank of lights on the southwest pole went off.
Rake Field was dark.
* * *
Most of the Spartans sitting quietly in the bleachers did not know Messina without Eddie Rake. And for the older ones who were very young when he arrived as an unknown and untested twenty-eight-year-old football coach, his influence on the town was so overpowering that it was easy to assume he'd always been there. After all,
