A second-quarter letdown cost the Oxford Wildcats a chance to advance in the state playoff race.
The Davison Cardinals scored four TDs in the second stanza en-route to a 35-7 victory over Oxford ending the Cats? season.
While the loss ended Oxford’s hopes of advancing, it was a good year for the Wildcats who finished at 8-2 and a share of the Flint Metro League title. Davison has knocked the Wildcats out of the state playoffs three times in the past four years.
Oxford’s defense, which had played very well the previous two games, looked very good in the first quarter, holding the Cardinals scoreless.
Both teams were scoreless near the end of the first quarter when Zach Line had a tremendous run of 48-yards in which he broke several tackles before scoring. Following Don Pohl’s conversion, Oxford led 7-0.
Davison’s running back Richard Kirksey took over the game at that point, scoring three TDs in the second quarter on runs of 4, 21 and 75 yards. He had more than 200 yards rushing in the second quarter.
The 75-yard TD run seemed to doom the Cats when it came after Oxford failed to score which could have made it 21-14 before halftime. The final back-breaker came on a perfect TD pass of 34 yards with only 20 seconds left in the half. The pass was from QB Jared Cowan to Dan Thwing and gave Davison a 28-7 lead..
The Cats could never get its offense into gear after the first quarter.
Line played most of the game at quarterback following his success at that position last week in the team’s victory over Linden. He finished with 129 yards rushing on 22 carries and the Cats had 223 yards in offense. Davison had more than 440 yards in offense.
The Cats did end their season on one high note as they were voted ‘Local 4/ClickOnDetroit’s Team of the Week.?
Of the more than 57,000 votes cast on Channel 4 WDIV’s website, almost 25,000 were for Oxford High.