Last week BHP stayed in Anderson County and made the short trip up to Wren for what was, for most purposes, a region championship. The atmosphere and the weather finally started to feel like they should for a game of that size, and the game itself lived up to the billing.
Wren’s first possession went five plays for 14 yards and ended in a punt, and the Bears made it clear early that the Hurricanes weren’t going to simply lean on them in the run game. BHP took over at its own 25, picked up 5 yards on two runs, and dropped back to throw on third down. That pass was intercepted, the first of three on the night, and Wren suddenly had the ball at the BHP 37.
Here’s the part I keep coming back to. The short field didn’t produce a short drive. Wren needed nine plays and nearly six minutes to work down to the 9, where the BHP defense forced a fourth-and-3. The Hurricanes kept their offense on the field, and Jacob Owings hit Caiden Hill on a 9 yard corner pass to put Wren on the board first.
BHP went three and out after the kickoff and punted it right back. Wren ran out what was left of the first quarter and scored on the opening play of the second, and with a missed PAT the Hurricanes led 13-0 with nearly three quarters still to play. On the road, against the team everyone had already given the win to, with the offense still looking for a rhythm, a two-score deficit starts to look a lot taller than 13 points has any right to.
Then the defense went to work, and the next stretch of the second quarter was about as chaotic as football gets. After another three and out, the Bears forced a fumble and recovered it. The offense couldn’t cash in the short field and came up empty on fourth down, so the defense decided to handle the scoring itself on the very next snap. Amire Rosemond picked off the pass and took it 45 yards the other way, and halfway through the second quarter it was 13-7.
Wren held the ball for exactly three plays after the kickoff. On third-and-8 the Bears knocked it loose, and Rosemond was there again to recover it near midfield. BHP couldn’t move it and had to punt, and then the Hurricanes muffed the return and handed the Bears the ball at the 13. Three plays later Rylan Crooks scrambled in from 8 yards out, and a team that had been staring up at a 13-0 hole not long before was suddenly ahead 14-13.
The lead didn’t make it to halftime. Wren went 97 yards in five plays and carried a 20-14 lead into the locker room.
If you have watched this team after halftime this season, you already know how the third quarter went. BHP has given up one third-quarter touchdown all year, one in eight games, and Wren didn’t add to that total. The Hurricanes managed next to nothing for most of the period, while the Bears’ three possessions ended in a turnover on downs, and a punt. Wren got the ball back with just over a minute left in the quarter and drove 46 yards into the fourth to make it 28-14.
And again BHP had an answer. Rosemond took the ensuing kickoff 85 yards to the Wren 6, and three plays later the Bears were back within a score at 28-21 with nine minutes to play. Then the defense did it one more time. With Wren knocking at the goal line, the Bears forced another fumble and took over at their own 3, needing 97 yards to tie the game.
That’s where it slipped away. The Wren defense came up with its second interception of the night, the Hurricanes went down and scored, and a pick six on the next BHP drive closed things out. Of Wren’s 41 points, 21 came in the fourth quarter.
So how does a team win the turnover battle 5-3 and still lose by 20? Mostly it comes down to what happened after each one. Wren turned BHP’s three interceptions into 20 points. One became a touchdown on the short field in the first quarter, another set up a fourth-quarter score, and the last went back the other way for six. BHP turned its five takeaways into 14 points, the Rosemond return and the Crooks scramble after the muffed punt.
There’s a second number hiding in there that matters even more for this week. BHP’s three touchdowns came on a 45 yard interception return, a 13 yard drive and a 6 yard drive. The defense and the return game did nearly all of the heavy lifting on the scoreboard, and the offense never got a long scoring march going against the best defense BHP has seen all season. That isn’t meant as a shot at anybody, because the Hurricanes deserve their share of credit. It is, however, the clearest thread running from last Friday night to this one, and we’ll come back to it.
I know a 20 point loss looks bad on paper. If you sat through it, though, you know BHP was right there all night, and there was more good in that game than the final margin will ever admit.
Start with Amire Rosemond, because a line like his deserves more than a passing mention. He had three kickoff returns for 109 yards, four solo tackles, a tackle for loss, two fumble recoveries, a pass breakup and a 45 yard pick six, all in a game for a region championship. Now read it again and remember he’s a freshman.
Leelin Laburda was all over the field too, finishing with 9 total tackles (7 solo), a tackle for loss, a forced fumble and a quarterback hurry. Christian Brown, Ty Dubose and Adrian McGlotten each added 7 tackles, which is what it looks like when a defense gets to the football as a group instead of waiting on one guy to make every play.
The game didn’t go the way we hoped. The defense that showed up in it, though, is one I’d be glad to take into the playoffs.
Week 9 Preview
BHP closes the 2026 regular season with a road trip to Greenwood to take on the Emerald Vikings. This will be the ninth meeting between the two programs, and the Bears have won every one of the first eight. Emerald is one of only three teams BHP has played at least five times without ever losing to, along with McDuffie and Pendleton.
History is nice, but it doesn’t suit up on Friday, and this is not the Emerald team BHP is used to seeing. The Vikings have sat in the top five in 3A for early in the season, they have one of the best dual-threat quarterbacks in the state, and the task in front of the Bears is as tough as any they’ve faced this year. The reward matches the size of the task. A win would give BHP’s playoff seeding a huge boost and could even open the door to a first-round bye. More on that in a bit.
Emerald opened 4-0 with wins over Crescent (21-6), Newberry (70-34), Woodruff (52-31) and Broome (56-14) before dropping its first game to 5A Lexington, 31-21. The Vikings bounced right back with a 55-54 win over Saluda, which looks better and better every week, and then opened region play by handling Palmetto 41-3. From there things got tougher. Wren beat them 37-30 in one of the biggest games in the Upstate this season, and last week Powdersville found a way to win 41-21.
That leaves Emerald at 6-3 overall and 1-2 in the region. The Vikings have cooled off lately, but even sputtering, they’re one of the most explosive teams in 3A. Over nine games they’ve averaged just under 41 points a night, and they’ve topped 50 four times.
The engine of all that offense is junior quarterback Beau Hite. He’s thrown for more than 1,800 yards this season, completing nearly 63 percent of his passes with 18 touchdowns against just four interceptions. That’s efficient enough on its own, but what makes him dangerous is what happens when he pulls the ball down. Hite has run for 406 yards on 43 carries, a shade over 9 yards every time he tucks it. BHP has already seen dynamic quarterbacks this year in Owings at Wren and Grass at Daniel, and Hite brings a different flavor of the same problem. He’s also committed to play baseball at the University of South Carolina, so the arm talent isn’t exactly up for debate.
His top targets come as a trio. Desiray Christian Jr. leads the way with 41 catches for 624 yards and 4 touchdowns. Keiron Brown is the one who finds the end zone, with 29 catches for 520 yards and 8 scores, and Coleson Marino has added 30 catches for 425 yards and 5 touchdowns. Together they account for more than 86 percent of Hite’s passing yards. That tells you the ball goes where Emerald wants it to go, and it also tells a defense exactly who needs to be accounted for on every snap.
The most dangerous player in that backfield might not be the quarterback, though. Jamerion Moore was thrust into full-time duty after the expected starter went down in the second game of the season, and he has run with it ever since. Moore has 1,269 rushing yards on 161 carries, nearly 8 yards a pop, with 24 touchdowns. He went from backup to workhorse and became the most productive rusher in the region along the way.
Now set that next to this. BHP has not allowed a 100 yard rusher all season. Spread Moore’s 1,269 yards across Emerald’s nine games and you get better than 140 a week. One of those two numbers is going to bend Friday night, and whichever one bends first will tell you a lot about how this game goes.
As a group, this offense has piled up 400 or more yards in every game but three, and those three were the three losses. Lexington held the Vikings to 315, Wren to 386 and Powdersville to 301. Is 400 yards some kind of law of physics for Emerald? Probably not. Nine games is a small sample, and the numbers guy in me knows a tidy pattern like that can be more coincidence than cause. It’s still a pretty good line to aim for. Keep Emerald under 400 yards and BHP is playing the kind of game the Vikings haven’t won yet this year.
Defensively, the Vikings have one mission, and it’s to get the ball back to that offense as fast as possible. They come into Friday with 6 interceptions and 10 forced fumbles, 6 of which they’ve recovered, plus 17 sacks and 66 tackles for loss (those numbers are self-reported via MaxPreps). That’s a defense that lives in the backfield and wreaks havoc on whoever it lines up against.
Emerald plays a 3-4 front, and the centerpiece is defensive tackle Tyrell Cloud. Cloud has 64 total tackles, 20 tackles for loss, 12 quarterback hurries, 3 forced fumbles and 6 sacks. A lot of linemen would be happy to call that a career, and he’s done it in nine games. His 20 tackles for loss alone are nearly a third of the team’s total. Behind him, linebacker Hayden Doerflein has racked up 121 tackles, which works out to more than 13 a game.
This front seven may be the most athletic group BHP has seen all season. Nobody in it is monstrous, but they’re powerful and fast, and like most good defenses they get to the ball together.
I see three things BHP has to do to win Friday.
First, extend drives. The Bears don’t need to put up 400 yards, but they do need to convert and keep drives alive. Staying on the field pays off in two ways. The obvious one is that more snaps mean more chances to score. The less obvious one is what it does to a fast but not especially big front that has spent three quarters chasing the football, because that’s when 3 yard runs start turning into 7 yard runs and contested throws start turning into completions. BHP has been at its best this season in the games where it owns time of possession, and every minute the Bears hold the ball is a minute Hite and Moore spend watching from the sideline.
Second, the defense needs to score. In BHP’s wins this season, the defense didn’t stop at keeping teams out of the end zone. It put points on the board itself, and we watched it do exactly that at Wren. Against a team that likes to throw, with the temperatures dropping, there will be chances to take the ball away. The complication is that Hite has thrown only four interceptions all year, so those chances may come rarely, which is why last Friday’s habit of punching the ball out matters so much. Four of BHP’s five takeaways at Wren were fumbles. Forcing turnovers is one thing, and making Emerald pay for them is the rest of the job.
Third, leave the Wren game behind you. That one was billed (maybe slightly by me) as bigger than it was. Yes, it was for a region championship, and that’s always a goal. And yes, as we went over earlier, it was a lot closer than the final score suggests. But a loss can’t beat you twice unless you let it, and there is a lot riding on this one.
With a win, BHP locks up the No. 2 seed out of the region, which would most likely make the Bears the 5th overall seed in the Upper State. Depending on how a few other games shake out, a win could even push BHP up to the 4th seed, and that comes with a first-round bye. With a loss, the Bears slide to 7th, possibly 9th seed. That’s a huge swing in seeding for one Friday night, and it opens a door that a loss would shut. Come out flat, play without urgency, and this team could land in a playoff spot it really doesn’t want.
But I expect the Bears to do what they’ve done all season. This is a group that started 0-2 and then reeled off five straight wins, so nobody has to explain bouncing back to them.
So here’s where it all lands. Emerald brings the most explosive offense BHP has seen all season, a quarterback who can hurt you with his arm or his legs, and a defense whose whole purpose is to hand that offense the ball again. BHP brings a defense that hasn’t let a back reach 100 yards and a series history that has never once gone the other way. If the Bears can stay on the field long enough to keep Emerald’s offense cold, and keep forcing the kind of mistakes they forced at Wren, the seeding takes care of itself and that door to a bye stays cracked open. None of that asks BHP to be something it hasn’t been for most of this season. It just asks the Bears to be themselves for four full quarters.
Previous Matchup: 2023 Round 1 Playoff Game Stats
Score: BHP 63 -- Emerald 7
2025 Upper State Championship BHP Stats:
Team Rushing: 35 rushes for 277 yards and 4 TDs
Team Passing: 9/13/1 for 119 yards and 5 TDs
Team Total: 48 plays for 396 yards and 9 TDs
Rushing Leader: Marquise Henderson - 13 rushes for 132 yards and 2 TDs
Passing Leader: Noah Thomas - 9/13/1 for 119 yards and 5 TDs (tied a school record for passing TDs in a game)
Receiving Leader: Qua Alexander - 5 receptions for 64 yards and 2 TDs
Defensive Leader: Colby Bates - 5 solo, 1 assist, 1 INT for 21 defensive points
Emerald Team Yardage:
Team Rushing: 27 rushes for 206 yards and 1 TD
Team Passing: 7/16/1 for 23 yards
Team Total: 43 plays for 229 yards and 1 TD
Rushing Leader: Key Holloway - 12 rushes for 163 yards and 1 TD
Passing Leader: Key Holloway - 7/15/0 for 23 yards
Receiving Leaders: Karson Wright - 2 receptions for 10 yards
Quick Stats
- BHP is 8-0 all-time against Emerald.
- There are only 3 teams BHP has played 5 or more times and has never lost to (Emerald 8-0, McDuffie 14-0 and Pendleton 15-0).
- BHP has not allowed a 100 yard rusher this season.
- BHP has given up just 1 TD in the 3rd quarter this season.
- BHP has been outscored in the 4th quarter 78-29 this season.
- BHP has forced 15 turnovers, nearly 2 per game.
- BHP is 38-22 all-time in the last game of the regular season.
- BHP has won its last seven regular-season finales played on the road.
- Emerald has been BHP’s regular-season finale three times.
- BHP is 4-4 in season finales after starting 5-3.
- Emerald has gained 400+ yards in all but 3 games this season, and those three were the losses to Lexington (315), Wren (386) and Powdersville (301).
- Since 2014 BHP has caused 5 or more turnovers in 3 games, the Wren game was the first BHP lost in that set.
Wrap Up
Friday at Wren hurt, and there’s no use pretending otherwise. But the longer you look at it, the more it reads like a game BHP was a few plays from taking, decided by what happened after the turnovers more than by how many there were. The defense took the ball away again and again, the return game kept flipping the field, and a freshman put together a night people in Belton and Honea Path will be talking about for a while. That’s a team with plenty left to play for.
Now the Bears head to Greenwood to face an Emerald team that can score in bunches and a series history that has always leaned BHP’s way. History won’t help much once the ball is kicked off, but a win would, giving the Bears’ playoff seeding a huge lift and maybe even opening the door to a first-round bye if a few other results break the right way. Hold onto the football, make that offense earn every yard, and let the defense keep doing what it has done all year. Do that, and Them Bears head into the playoffs with a lot more than momentum.
Prediction: BHP 28 - Emerald 17
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