American Heritage mounts incredible rally in matchup of nationally-ranked teams

A stone-cold classic in the opener.

That’s what nation got from Dia Bell and American Heritage Friday night, a comeback so improbable that the Patriots’ own coach could hardly believe it.

Eighth-ranked Heritage stormed back from a four-touchdown second-half deficit to stun St. Joseph’s Prep (Pa.) 31-28 in perhaps the best Broward County National Football Showcase game to date.

The Patriots scored 31 points in the game’s final 15:55, including three rushing touchdowns by transfer running back Jonathan Bueno and a go-ahead, 40-yard field goal by senior kicker Kade Bailey with four seconds left, to keep alive Heritage’s perfect season – and national title -- hopes.

They certainly picked the perfect stage to do it. ESPN2 broadcast the showdown of defending state champs, and surely didn’t regret it.

“The will is always there,” said Bell, the nation’s top quarterback recruit and candidate for Gatorade player of the year. “I’m never giving up until that clock hits 0:00 in the fourth quarter. The score doesn’t matter to me.”

To complete the comeback, Heritage needed a perfect finish – and totally imperfect meltdown by the opposition.

The visiting Hawks went ahead 28-0 with 5:55 left in the third quarter after junior quarterback Charlie Foulke’s second touchdown run of the game, a one-yard Tush Push that everyone not wearing black and yellow thought was the clincher.

But in the 16 minutes of game time that followed, Heritage’s defense locked St. Joe’s down, and got two massive special teams plays to flip the field – a long kickoff return and a blocked punt that went off the back of the Hawks’ upman on their final possession.

Those breakdowns gave Bell, Bueno and breakout star Dylan Denson the opening they needed.

After a totally disjointed first half of offensive football, Heritage found its footing.

And Bell turned into the superstar everyone expected from the start.

He lost two fumbles in the first half, including one that just slipped right out of his hands in a game that was delayed 90 minutes by thunderstorms. It was emblematic of a Patriots team that couldn’t get out of its own way. Drives got snuffed out by penalties. They gave up a touchdown on a blocked punt.

Put simply, they couldn’t have played worse through the first two and a half quarters.

“We’ve all played better than we did tonight,” said Bell, whose only touchdown pass was a 31-yard dart to Denson early in the fourth quarter to draw Heritage to within seven. “We played really bad in the first half. But we came out on our second half and we were on our A-game, though. That’s all that matters.”

Added Heritage coach Mike Smith, who was a bit dazed in victory after the game: “There’s no play for 28-0, so you just keep battling possession by possession, play by play. Luckily, we had enough time.”

“We did everything a bad football team could do, you know, but second half, we came out, and we just kept plugging along and making plays and, man, that’s crazy. That’s crazy.”

With Bell – who was just as dangerous with his legs as he was his arms Friday -- Bueno and the Patriots’ talented collection of receivers, they’re never out of a game, no matter how poorly they play early.

“Having No. 3 helps,” Smith said of Bell. “He got into a rhythm, and that, you know, we kind of went a little tempo and everybody settled down. We just had to settle down.

“Those guys continued to battle, and that’s the way they’d been trained, and they just believed, man. They just have power and belief.”