TIM HAYES Bristol Herald Courier
CLINCHPORT -- Grayson County High School's football team has been racking up the mileage and the milestones, and there is one major road trip still to make.
Destination: Salem Stadium, site of the VHSL Class 1 title game.
Junior quarterback Maverik Goad keyed a fourth-quarter rally that featured 27 points and the erasure of a 15-point deficit as the Blue Devils earned a 40-34 win over Rye Cove on Saturday afternoon in a thrilling state semifinal showdown.
Grayson County (10-3) plays Essex (12-1) at 11:30 a.m. in Salem on Dec. 14 in what will be the first appearance in the state football finals for the school from Independence. Essex advanced with a 30-8 win over Altavista.
The Blue Devils have certainly earned it.
There was an 18-16 victory at Mountain Empire District rival George Wythe in the regional semifinals.
That was followed by a 20-0 triumph at unbeaten Bath County, champs of the Pioneer District.
Then came Saturday's lengthy venture to Scott County to face a team that had rolled up 13 consecutive victories in winning the Cumberland District and Region 1D championships.
Grayson County gutted out each of those wins and now will play for a state trophy.
"Heart," Goad said. "There are a lot of things that you see in a team that you find from different years. This year it's heart and we have no quit in this team. All gas, no breaks."
Grayson County's hearts probably sunk when Landon Lane threw a 32-yard touchdown pass to Luke Jessee on the first play of the fourth quarter to extend Rye Cove's lead to 28-13.
What did Grayson County coach Stephen James tell his team at that point?
"I just told them we were going to have to speed some things up and going to some of our hand-signal stuff and getting a faster pace," James said. "We were able to capitalize with that."
That was good for Goad.
"We play much better when we go fast," Goad said.
He threw two touchdown passes to his brother, Mac Goad, and also rushed for two scores in the fourth quarter.
Maverik Goad finished 14 of 24 through the air for 282 yards with four touchdowns and no interceptions.
Mac Goad caught seven passes for 151 yards and three scores.
"If you ask me," Maverik Goad said. "He's the best receiver in the state. That's in my opinion and I'll stick with that."
Mac's brother is a pretty dang good QB as well, upstaging his counterpart in Landon Lane, Rye Cove's playmaking senior signal-caller.
Lane was 11 of 20 for 269 yards with two touchdowns and one interception, while rushing for 130 yards and two scores himself.
"[Maverik] struggled a little bit early with some reads on some things," James said. "He turned it around and made some big plays for us too."
His 37-yard touchdown run with 4:18 remaining gave Grayson County its first lead of the day at 33-28.
Rye Cove responded by regaining the lead with 2:10 left on a 2-yard touchdown run by junior fullback Will Rollins.
"We were confident, but we knew we had to make a play on defense," Rollins said. "We just fell short at the end."
Goad went back to work as Grayson County needed just six yards in 65 plays to respond.
The big gainer was a 53-yard completion to David Mitchell that put the ball on Rye Cove's 3-yard line.
That happened to be Mitchell's only catch of the game.
"I got open on that play and the only thing going through my mind was my teammates," Mitchell said. "That was huge."
Goad plunged in from the 1-yard line with 27 seconds left for the game-winning score.
Rye Cove ended the game at Grayson County's 13-yard line as Jessee caught a pass from Lane before being tackled on the final play and that set off a long-awaited celebration for the Blue Devils.
"The best way to describe it is they made more plays in the fourth quarter than we did," said Rye Cove coach Gary Collier. "I wish we had 30 more seconds, and we would have at least gotten a shot at the end zone there. That's just the way it is."
Few predicted Grayson County to be playing in the state finals when the Blue Devils started 0-2.
"Absolutely not," Mitchell said. "We've just seen our practices getting better over time."
Warm up the bus.
Grayson County has another journey to make.
"We knew it was going to be a physical game," James said. "I really didn't think neither one of us would have this many points on the board, but luckily we were able to survive a shootout."
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