FINAL: Geneva Defeats Larkin 41-34 in Wild and Scary Game — on High School Cube

OK, it's not Halloween yet, not even close, but it was one headless-horseman-style, wild and scary football ride for Geneva fans Friday night.

The Vikings held on to beat Elgin Larkin 41-34 at Memorial Field, but not before the Royals nearly pulled off a little Homecoming magic with a handful of troll-sized plays on offense and a fourth-quarter strip and 67-yard scoring gallop by Alex Duran to pull within a touchdown with about two-and-a-half minutes left in the game.

Geneva secured the win with T.J. Miller's 5-yard first-down run with 1:48 to play, allowing quarterback Dan Santacaterina to take a knee three times to end the potential nightmare.

Credit Geneva with never panicking — even after Larkin took a 21-20 lead early in the third quarter and held the ball and good field position when the score was tied 27-27.

Here's how it played out, from the beginning.

Geneva led 13-0 until 2:07 left in the half, when, apparently, all heck broke loose. According to the High School Cube summary, Larkin scored on a 64-yard play to make it 13-7, then Geneva scored on an 85-yard play to make it 20-7, then Damion "Bubba" Clemons scored on a 90-yard play to make it 20-14 at the half.

To start the third quarter, Clemons scored on a 67-yard pass play from Kemmerin Blalark to put Larkin ahead 21-20.

The Vikings came right back, established the running game behind Miller and Max Woodworth, and scored on a series of runs capped by a 6-yard Miller scamper to make it 27-21.

Then, like one of those characters in a John Carpenter film, Clemons struck again, this time scoring on an 80-yard run. The silver bullet for Viking fans was that Larkin missed the extra point to keep the game deadlocked at 27-27.

The Viking defense forced Larkin deep in its own territory after a sack and got the ball back with good field position. Woodworth ran 22 yards for the score and eased the suspense a bit.

In the fourth quarter, an interception by Pace Temple gave the Vikings the ball at their own 24-yard line. Led again by Miller and Woodworth, Geneva barreled on a series of running plays to the 16-yard line, where Santacaterina hit Kyle Brown for the touchdown and, seemingly, a comfortable 41-27 lead. 

Geneva's defense held again, but as the Vikings were set to wrap things up, that was when Duran stripped the football and scored to set up the frightening finish.

Geneva moves to 2-2 on the season and 1-1 in the Upstate Eight River Division.

Return to this article a little later, and you can watch highlights courtesy of High School Cube.