HAMMOND | In their view, the Times No. 10 Hammond Wildcats might be in the same boat as the Green Bay Packers.
With a score of 28-21, Hammond scored on a 16-play, 72-yard scoring drive.
The Wildcats went for two, and it appeared Eric Schreiber connected with Anthony McClendon for a successful score as the side judge signaled for a TD. But the back judge raced halfway across the end zone and called it incomplete.
The officials had a conference, and the controversial call stood.
After a late Lowell TD, the Wildcats fell 35-27 in non-conference action Friday night.
George Fields, who rushed for 273 yards on 31 carries and 3 TDs, fumbled the opening snap from scrimmage for Lowell, which was recovered by Hammond's Derrick English.
Right off the bat, the Wildcats went for the jugular on a fly pattern, which wound up being incomplete. But that took Lowell by surprise and loosened up the defense.
Hammond exploited that as the next play went for 56 yards on a handoff to Jesse Woods-Curtis to put Hammond up 6-0.
Fields and the Red Devils (4-3) regrouped on a nine-play, 47-yard scoring drive early in the second quarter.
Hammond (4-2) converted on two fourth downs as part of a 16-play, 79-yard drive that ate up six minutes and was capped by an Eric Schreiber pass to Woods-Curtis from a bubble screen on 4th-and-13.
Hammond could have extended its lead at the end of the first half as the team drove all the way to the Lowell eight yard line, but Schreiber was picked off in the end zone by Bryan Thomas.
After the Red Devil O-line imposed its will on the Hammond D with two hard-pounding TD runs, Woods-Curtis took the Lowell kickoff 90 yards up the gut for a score to tie it at 21 after the extra point.
Lowell gave themselves some breathing room with a 12-play, 61-yard drive finished off by a Mitch Leckrone 19-yard pass from Thomas with 10:26 left in regulation.
That's when the big drive occurred for the Wildcats, which was capped off by a Schreiber 1-yard TD run. But that call was overturned.
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