Bearcats win seventh in a row

Article by Ethan Nahté Photos courtesy of Mena Public Schools

The Mena Bearcats seem determined to catch up to the De Queen Leopards in their 111-year-old rivalry. Mena has now beat De Queen for the seventh game in a row. They have also won 10 of their last 14 meetings.

Friday night, Hernandez kicked a 29yard field goal at 5:42. Moments later with 4:16 left in the first, Hernandez kicked a 37-yard field goal to give the Bearcats 6 points.

No. 15 Dax McMeillon completed a 34-yard pass to No. 1 Elijah Smith for a touchdown before time ran out in the first. The Bearcats completed the extra point and ended the quarter 13-0.

With 28 seconds left in the third, No. 8 Michael Sullivan ran for a 3-yard touchdown, giving the Bearcats a 32-7 lead heading into the fourth.

McMeillon completed a 17-yard pass to No. 2 Sean Sullivan for the last touchdown of the night at 10:11. Mena won the game 39-7.

While Mena converted 50% of their third downs as well as a fourth down, the Leopards were simply lacking. Mena also dominated De Queen with their passing game. McMeillon completed nine of 15 passes for 100 yards total.

Although the Leopards did manageone interception, they had five fumbles and only recovered one. Mena fumbled four times but recovered all but one.

Penalty trouble caused the De Queen team more woes than anything. The Bearcats were penalized five times for a total of 35 yards while the Leopards were penalized 10 times for a total of 111 yards.

The 111 penalty yards and the fact the two teams first played one another 111 years ago seems like a strange coincidence.

De Queen retains the lead of 51-315 after 87 meetings since 1912, but the Leopards almost beat themselves as much as the Bearcats beat up on them.

The first official game of the season for both teams was pushed back an hour a few days beforehand in hopes that the temperature gauge would drop a bit and the sun wouldn’t be casting light directly across the entire field as temperatures with the heat index were hovering around 100 degrees even as late as 8 p.m.

As the first quarter wound down, No. 4 Jair Hernandez was brought in to attempt kicking one through the uprights. In 2022, Hernandez was the star of the game when he kicked a 22-yard field with less than 49 seconds to win the match-up 16-14 against De Queen.

The Bearcats could not immediately capitalize on the momentum they had generated and carry it over to the second quarter. Still, the Leopards found themselves down 19-0 after a 4-yard run by Mena’s No. 24 Brody Peters at 10:34.

Down, but not out, the Leopards’ No. 7 Cole Binkley ran 17-yards to the end zone to finally get the Leopards on the board with 1:14 left in the first half. The teams went to the locker room with Mena leading 19-7.

In the third quarter, Peters had a single yard run with 6:21 left. Peters would outdistance everyone on the field and end the night with 97 yards rushing.

Mena and Ashdown are both 1-0 overall as the season just gets started. The Bearcats travel to take on the Centerpoint Knights in Amity at 7 p.m. this Friday. The temperatures are expected to be more comfortable compared to last week.