St. Vincent takes home win, heads to playoffs

PERRYVILLE, Mo. -- The St. Vincent High School football team finally came alive in the fourth quarter Friday night.

As a result, the Indians are headed to the playoffs.

St. Vincent scored the game's final 16 points -- all in the last 10 minutes -- to beat visiting Portageville 16-6.

"It was real sluggish, but it got exciting toward the end," sophomore quarterback Tim Schumer said.

The Indians, who have won four of their past five games, improved to 4-5 overall and 2-0 in Class 1 District 1. St. Vincent has locked up no worse than second place in the district.

St. Vincent's Derek Triller carries on the play that set up the first touchdown against Portageville during the fourth quarter Friday at St. Vincent. (Fred Lynch)

St. Vincent will end the regular season Thursday at Hayti, also 2-0 in the district. The winner claims the district title and hosts a first-round playoff game. The loser will hit the road for its playoff opener.

"It's good," senior Kyle Rollet said of a postseason berth. "But we want more. We want first [in the district]."

For the longest time it looked like the Indians might need a victory next week to sneak into the playoffs.

St. Vincent slogged through a miserable first half that saw it lose three fumbles deep in its territory. The Indians' defense came up big every time as things remained scoreless at the break.

"We were absolutely sluggish," senior C.J. Pavlovsky said. "Too many turnovers, but our defense played pretty well. We kept holding them."

St. Vincent defenders Justin Breig and Cody Comte try to tackle Portageville's Fernando Minnis during the second quarter Friday.

The Indians were fortunate to be tied at the intermission because all six of Portageville's first-half possessions reached St. Vincent territory.

Portageville (3-6, 0-2 district) ran 38 first-half plays to just 15 for the Indians. The Bulldogs hurt themselves with eight penalties for 77 yards over the opening two quarters, which helped hold them back.

"Portageville was a tough team and we didn't play well in the first half," St. Vincent coach Paul Sauer said.

St. Vincent still couldn't get things going in the third quarter, which saw Portageville finally score on an 84-yard drive capped by a 4-yard run by quarterback Caden Robbins with 1 minute, 55 seconds left. The extra point failed.

The Indians, hampered by poor field position most of the night, finally flipped things around in that regard to get on the scoreboard.

St. Vincent's Cody Comte and Justin Eggers bring down Portageville's Fernando Minnis during the second quarter Friday.

Portageville, backed up near its goal line early in the final period, took an intentional safety instead of punting from the back of the end zone. That made it 6-2 with 9:14 remaining.

The move looked like a good one for the Bulldogs when they got off a nice free kick. A personal foul penalty on St. Vincent meant the Indians had to start from its 24-yard line.

St. Vincent responded with a 76-yard drive that took only five plays and was capped by Rollet's acrobatic 21-yard touchdown reception with 7:07 left.

Schumer appeared to throw a bit too high for Rollet near the back of the end zone, but the 6-foot-3 receiver tipped the ball with his right hand at the top of his leap. He then pulled the ball into his body as he tumbled to the ground.

"I thought it was going to be over me," said Rollet, who called the catch one of the best he's ever made.

Said a smiling Schumer: "He makes me look good. I thought it was just out of his reach, but he pulled it down."

Sauer called it "as pretty a catch as I've seen."

Rollet added the PAT to make it 9-6.

The Indians forced a three-and-out, then took over on Portageville's 40-yard line. They used more than four minutes before Pavlovsky scored the clinching touchdown, on a 4-yard run with 1:39 left. Rollet tacked on the PAT.

Pavlovsky went over the 1,000-yard mark from his tailback position by gaining a hard-earned 54 yards on 19 carries against Portageville's rugged defense. Pavlovsky entered the night with 958 yards. He now has 10 touchdowns.

Most of St. Vincent's offense came through the passing game as Schumer threw for 155 of the Indians' 242 total yards.

Rollet snared all five of Schumer's completions -- in 10 attempts -- with every catch gaining at least 21 yards. Rollet has eight touchdowns among his 27 receptions this season.

Rollet also played defense -- sometimes at end, sometimes at safety -- in addition to averaging 42 yards on two punts, booming two of three kickoffs out of the end zone and booting the two extra points.

It took all of that and more for the Indians to survive as they fumbled nine times, although they lost just the three in the first half.

"We kept killing ourselves," Rollet said. "We'd fumble, get a stupid penalty. We finally put a few drives together where we didn't kill ourselves."

The Indians were able to laugh about all their miscues since they survived in the even statistical contest that saw Portageville end with 261 yards of offense.

"It might not have been the prettiest thing, but in district play you take a win any way you can get it," Sauer said.

St. Vincent 16, Portageville 6

Portageville 0 0 6 0 -- 6

St. Vincent 0 0 0 16 -- 16

Third Quarter

P -- Caden Robbins 4 run (kick failed), 1:55

Fourth Quarter

S -- Safety, 9:14

S -- Kyle Rollet 21 pass from Tim Schumer (Rollet kick), 7:07

S -- C.J. Pavlovsky 4 run (Rollet kick), 1:39

P S

First downs 12 12

Rushes-yards 36-125 37-87

Passing yards 136 155

Passes 15-24-1 5-10-0

Punts 4-26 2-42

Fumbles-Lost 3-2 9-3

Penalties-Yards 12-117 8-93

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING -- Portageville, Fred Treadwell 12-95, Fernando Minnis 13-25, Robbins 9-9, Oshea Minnis 1-1, team 1-minus 5. St. Vincent, Pavlovsky 19-54, Derek Triller 6-40, Schumer 4-15, Alex Hunt 1-1, team 7-minus 23.

PASSING -- Portageville, Robbins 14-22-0-118, Treadwell 1-1-0-18, Mason Kellams 0-1-1-0. St. Vincent, Schumer 5-10-0-155.

RECEIVING -- Portageville, Isaac Ray 5-67, F. Minnis 7-42, Lee Wallace 2-4, O. Minnis 1-23. St. Vincent, Rollet 5-155.