BEARCATS TO HOST SCRIMMAGE AGAINST DARDANELLE

If it seems like it’s been a while since there has been a home football game, that’s because it has. The last time the Bearcats were at home was for the opening round of the playoffs on November 11.

If it seems like it’s been a while since there has been a scrimmage (benefit) game at Bearcat Stadium, again, that’s because it has. Doc Crowley has never hosted one – the 2020 and 2021 scrimmages were in Charleston and last year the Bearcats went to Dardanelle.

All that changes tonight when the Bearcats host Dardanelle in advance of the 2023 season.

The Bearcats come into 2023 off of a 12-3 season in which they reached the state championship game for the 10th time in school history. Playing their first year in Class 5A, the Sand Lizards were 4-6 in 2022.

The Bearcats have been picked to win Conference 3-1 and are ranked #1 by Hooten’s Arkansas Football. Dardanelle is picked 7th in the 5A West.

The Bearcat ranking stems in part from the returning Dax Goff, who set a school record with 2,323 rushing yards and recorded 116 tackles a season ago, as well as the return of Rylen Ray, who missed all but the first 16 playing minutes of the 2022 season.

Also back are three-year starter Matt O’Bar who can play any position on the offensive line, as can Lance Sims, another senior who was a starter at center last year. Receiver Dakota Mattson was also a 2022 regular.

Those players will all turn around and play defensively as well, as will Demari Poole (61 tackles, nine for a loss) and Jace Washburn (48 tackles, 11 pass breakups, three interceptions), defensive starters as sophomores.

Washburn will also start at quarterback this season.

Hunter Warren, who moved up week eight of the season and started immediately, logging seven games of action as a freshman, recording 28 tackles. (He is shown above wrapping up Dylan Todd in last friday's intrasquad scrimmage.)

Other now sophomores to watch include Rhett Nietert, the 10-0 junior high quarterback, Chase Shelton, Seth Wilson, Conner Lentz, Conner Droemer, and Clint Osborne, though the latter is battling an injury.

While this one will obviously not count in official records, Booneville and Dardanelle have met 57 times with the Booneville holding a 40-17-0 edge (0.702). The schools last met in 2021 when the Bearcats won 32-0 in Dardanelle.

The Bearcats have won the last three times the schools met in the regular season, including a 21-20 thriller in 2017.

The format for tonight will be for the junior high teams of the respective schools starting play at 6 p.m. with two quarters of running clock with reserves facing off in the first quarter, starters in the second.

The second half of the junior high portion will feature standard play, with the exception of the kicking game being dead.

There will be four quarters of senior high action as well with the reserves playing the first quarter with a running clock and three quarters of standard play but, again, with a dead kicking game.

Following tonight’s festivities, the Bearcats will have 15 days to wait until their season opener at Ozark on September 1. Dardanelle will open next Friday (August 25) against Little Rock Hall.