BRODHEAD — A late comeback came up short for the Cardinals, as the pass-happy Beloit Turner Trojans scored a controversial touchdown on a pass with just 29 seconds left in the fourth quarter and went on to win 40-33.

Facing a second down and 10 from the Brodhead-Juda 20, Beloit Turner backup quarterback Daniel Burrows heaved a jump ball to Dai’Vontrelle Strong in the back of the end zone. Strong caught the ball at the peak of his jump, but by the time he landed on the ground, the ball was jarred loose and bounced out of bounds. Without video replay, the call on the field stood.

“As far as effort is concerned, I can’t ask for any more,” Brodhead-Juda coach Jim Matthys said. “We didn’t get blown out. I think you can bounce back from something like this. We gave ourselves a chance to win at the end, but you can’t help but think of some of the silly mistakes we made in the first half.”

Much of the entire game was a seesaw battle between the two Rock Valley Conference teams. Turner (2-3) opened the game with a nine-play, 70-yard TD drive to take an early 7-0 advantage. Strong, at 6-6, towers over Brodhead-Juda’s defensive backs and kept the opening drive alive with a 20-yard catch on fourth down. 

After a Cardinal 3-and-out, Turner needed just four plays to make it a two-score game. This time, it was Kenneth Draeving with a 14-yard strike to Gavin Frey. Draeving, at 6-5, was 21 of 34 through the air for 333 yards and two TDs. Strong had six catches for 124 yards.

“I didn’t feel like we were ready to play in the first quarter,” Matthys said. “I thought we didn’t wake up until the second quarter, and by then we are down 14 points. We’ve got to learn that we need to come out ready to go.”

Needing to counterpunch, the Cardinals (2-3) followed the lead of senior Nick Naramore, who rumbled 43 yards up the sidelines on the second play to get into the red zone. Two plays later, Naramore plunged forward eight yards for the score with 1:35 left in the first quarter.

Turner, which runs a spread offense, used a 41-yard strike to Strong on the next possession to set up a 1-yard score from Aiden Diehl. The Cardinals again countered, and on the third play of their next possession, quarterback Cade Walker found Dalton Naramore, who took it 56 yards to the house to make it 20-14 with 9:32 left before half.

Brodhead had a chance to take the lead before halftime, but a touchdown run by Nick Naramore was called back for an illegal shift. Three plays later, Turner’s Grant Revels picked off a pass at his own 7 with 3:58 left in the second quarter.

“We just made too many mistakes in the first half, and then we’re playing catch-up,” Matthys said. “We had a touchdown called back because our halfback went in motion when he’s not even supposed to be going in motion. There’s a touchdown that was taken off the board and the difference in the game.”

The Trojans marched down the field and Revels caught a 1-yard TD pass from Draeving with six seconds left to make it 26-14 at halftime.

“In the locker room at halftime, we really came together as a team. We knew what it would take to win. We were executing, but tiny mistakes just took us off course,” Nick Naramore said.

The Cards wasted no time in the third quarter getting back into the game, as Nick Naramore bounced off three would be tacklers and dashed 45 yards for a touchdown on sixth play of the drive. The extra point brought the deficit to five at 26-21.

Not to be without controversy, two plays later, on 2nd-and-9 from his own 19, Draeving ran a bootleg up along the Cardinal’s sideline, seemingly stepping out of bounds at the 25 and 30 yard lines, only to cut back inside and go untouched for 71 yards until he was brought down at the Brodhead-Juda 9-yard-line. Four plays later, on fourth-and-goal, Draeving ran a quarterback Draw to put his team up 32-21.

“I never felt like we couldn’t move the ball on them, the problem was we couldn’t get our defense off the field for our offense to get on it. We let them off the hook at least three or four times where they converted on 3rd-and-long,” Matthys said. “I felt very good about us moving the ball and putting points on the board, but we just couldn’t get off the field enough.”

Dalton Naramore, Nick’s twin brother, went 59-yards on a TD run two plays later to again bring the Cardinals within striking distance.

Turner again looked poised to score on the following drive, driving deep into Cardinals’ territory until a series of unfortunate events. With a first down at the Brodhead-Juda 4, Burrows, entering for an injured Draeving, was sacked for a 10-yard loss after a bad snap. A delay of game call moved the Trojans back even further, and a 19-yard TD pass to Mickey Burrows was waved off due to an ineligible player downfield penalty. Facing a second-and-goal from the 24, another bad snap led to a loss of 16 yards. Two plays later, Turner punted from the 40 on fourth down.

Brodhead-Juda again went 3-and-out, but Draeving’s first pass of the following possession was intercepted by Gage Boegli. An 11-play, 90-yard drive was capped by Dalton Naramore, who ran 13-yards into the end zone with 4:24 left in the game to put his team ahead 33-32.

The lead only lasted a few minutes, as Turner went on to score the controversial touchdown at the end.

“It’s just little mistakes we are making are having a big impact. Like giving up 20-yard receptions on third down, that just can’t happen,” Dalton Naramore said.

The two teams had no problem moving the ball in the game, combining for 862 yards of offense. Turner finished with 487 yards of offense, including Draeving’s 435 total yards (333 passing, 102 rushing). The Cardinals ran for 291 yards on 33 rushing attempts and added another 84 yards through the air.

Walker was 5 of 9 passing with a touchdown and an interception. Nick Naramore had 176 yards rushing on 12 carries, while Dalton Naramore added 69 yards on 11 carries.

Brodhead-Juda next takes on East Troy, which was dominated by unbeaten Evansville in Week 5. Six teams in the Rock Valley are within clear striking distance of a playoff spot, with Evansville the only one to have clinched a postseason berth.

“The only way is up from here. We have to execute throughout the week; every day,” Dalton Naramore said. 

“It’s definitely a gut check. We definitely need to get our confidence up,” Nick Naramore said. ““Our confidence just wasn’t there. We have to pick it up next week.”