After seeing the hard work his players put in during the week leading up to Elkmont’s game with Lexington, there was no way Red Devils head coach Duane Wales was going to play for a tie. He was going for the win.

After Davis Hobbs scored a touchdown on a 23-yard run putting the score at 27-26 with 2:21 remaining, Wales called for a pass off of a fake extra point. It was executed perfectly. Ben Hobbs tossed a pass to Seth Coffman for the conversion that gave Elkmont a 28-27 lead they would hang on to.

“As we were driving down the field, I was thinking what I wanted to do if we did score, and I thought these kids have worked too hard just to play for overtime,” Wales said. “I had been preaching during the week that we weren’t going to Lexington to come back with a loss, and I had to be a man of my word. The kids had battled too hard to let it slip away. We have a pass off a fake extra point we’ve been working on since spring practice, and the kids executed it to perfection.”

It was a fitting climax to a game that saw Elkmont go down 14-0 at halftime, fight back to take a 20-14 lead, and then go down again 27-20 in the fourth quarter before scoring the final eight points of the game.

“I’m very, very proud of them,” Wales said. “They had worked so hard during our off week and in the week leading up to the game. It shows great character because we went down, took the lead and then went down again before coming back at the end of the game. I’m so proud of them, and it shows the character and will those guys have.”

Lexington looked to have control of the game in the first half, as the Golden Bears scored twice in the second quarter to take a 14-0 lead. The first score was an 11-yard run by Lucas Thigpen. The second was a 12-yard scoring run by Trey Martin.

Elkmont came out on fire in the third quarter and scored three consecutive touchdowns to take a 20-14 lead. Davis Hobbs started the scoring with a 43-yard touchdown run with 3:14 remaining in the third quarter, and then tied the game less than two minutes later when he found Ben Hobbs for a 47-yard touchdown pass. Ben returned the favor to Davis on the 2-point conversion attempt, which tied the game at 14.

Ben Hobbs then gave Elkmont its first lead when he intercepted a Lexington pass and returned it for a touchdown to put the Red Devils up 20-14 after the missed PAT.

But Lexington came back with the next two touchdowns to take back the lead. The first came with 8:52 remaining in the game on a 14-yard run by Martin, and it was followed by Martin’s touchdown pass to Daniel Thaxton. Critically, the extra point was missed after Lexington’s final touchdown following a bad snap, allowing Elkmont the chance to win the game.

It was a great night for both the Hobbs brothers, as Davis Hobbs ran for two touchdowns and threw for another, finishing the game with 68 passing yards and 83 rushing yards. Ben threw for two 2-point conversions, had an interception return for a touchdown, and had 68 receiving yards and 36 rushing yards.

“They are two of our major leaders, and we depend on them for a lot of things,” Wales said of the Hobbs twins. “We just called on our seniors at halftime to really step up and improve our play, and Ben and Davis just played lights out and gave everything they had. At the end of the game, both of those guys were wore out. It showed in the emotion they had after the game, how they were able to not only be our leaders in spirit but also lead us in their performance in the comeback win.”

Nick Gibson and Peyton Lovell led the Elkmont defense with nine tackles each.

Elkmont (1-4) returns to region play next week when the Red Devils travel to play Central-Florence.