By Chad Hayworth (for OzarksSportsZone.com)
MOUNTAIN VIEW – For the Liberty Eagles, it turns out that the eighth time is the charm.
The Eagles scored on the opening drive of the second half Saturday to take a 12-7 lead, and then turned the game over to its defense, who forced a turnover and then got stop after stop to secure a victory over Lamar in the Class 2 state quarterfinals.
Since 2010, the Tigers had defeated Liberty seven straight times, all in the state quarterfinals.
Coming into Saturday’s matchup, Eagles Coach Jansen Acklin said he and his staff did their best to ignore history.
“We tried to make sure our guys didn’t get caught up in the history of Liberty and Lamar,” he said. “This was about the 2025 team, and what they are capable of. This is the result of all their hard work and the sacrifice they put into the program.”
Nevertheless, based on the bear hugs Acklin and his players got as the stands emptied onto the field after the final whistle, the importance of finally beating Lamar can’t be overstated.
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As an EagleS player, Acklin played in the 2012 and 2013 Lamar games under the coaching of his father, Darin, who coached the team during six of the seven Eagle losses to the Tigers.
“I’ve tried to put it in the back of my mind,” Jansen Acklin said of his family’s ties to the game. “I knew coming in, that couldn’t be the story. We just wanted to make sure we made history by making it past this point.”
On the other sideline, Lamar Coach Jared Beshore, who played in the Lamar-Liberty games from 2010-2013, lamented the mistakes that sealed his team’s fate Saturday.
“We had a lot of self-inflicted wounds,” he said. “You can’t have those in November and expect to win.
“They made the plays they needed to make, and they didn’t make mistakes at the critical moments like we did. That was the difference in the ballgame.”
Liberty (10-2) looked to take an early lead Saturday, taking their first drive of the game to the Tiger 13-yard line. But an offensive pass interference call on third and 7 pushed the Eagles back and a pair of incomplete passes ended the drive.
Late in the first quarter, Lamar (8-4) got the ball on its own 23-yard line and mounted a 14-play, 77-yard drive that took nearly nine minutes off the clock.
Tiger quarterback Clayton Powell completed a 16-yard pass on third and 15 at midfield to keep the drive alive, then fed junior Terren Williams on seven of the next eight plays, culminating in a one-yard walk into the end zone for a 7-0 lead with 4:33 left to play in the half.
Liberty answered late in the quarter, when freshman quarterback Graham Tune found junior Jasper Melby along the left sideline for a 27-yard touchdown with 30 seconds left in the half.
The pair teamed up again on the opening drive of the third quarter, this time for 38 yards and a touchdown, giving Liberty a 12-7 lead.
On its first possession of the second half, Lamar again moved the ball. But on third and 7 at the Liberty 37-yard line, Powell lost the football and the Eagles recovered, snuffing out the promising drive.
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Liberty drove to the Lamar 17-yard line but could get no closer, turning the ball over on downs.
The teams traded three-and-outs, before Liberty dropped Williams at the line of scrimmage on fourth and 1 from the Tiger 20.
Lamar’s defense held, forcing an incomplete pass on fourth and goal from the 8-yard line with 3:22 to play.
“We really wanted to punch one in there late to really seal it,” Acklin said. “But it made it more exciting, the way it finished.”
Lamar, working without any timeouts remaining, pushed the ball into Liberty territory, but couldn’t covert on fourth and 3 at the Eagle 48-yard line. The stop was one of four fourth down conversions denied by the Eagle defense on Saturday.
“We returned nine of our guys that started on defense last year,” Acklin said. “That was something we used to build our confidence and trust in. We knew they were going to come up big here today.”
Tune completed 16 of 26 passes for 143 yards and two touchdowns for the Eagles, while senior Jaren Rutledge carried the ball 15 times for 37 yards, much of them late in the game as Liberty worked to milk the clock. Melby led the Eagle receivers with six catches for 88 yards and both touchdowns, while senior Parker Tune caught four balls for 29 yards and Kyle Roberts and Sawyer Morris each had three catches.
For Lamar, Willams led the Tigers with 80 yards on 18 carries, while also catching four passes for 29 yards.
Powell completed 10 of 16 passes for 70 yards and ran for 13 yards on 16 carries. Sophomore Jaydin Moore ran the ball eight times for 19 yards and caught a pass for four.
Liberty will be at home next Saturday to face Blair Oaks, the defending Class 3 state champion, who dropped into Class 2 for 2025.
