By Kevin Price For GCS Athletics A first half filled with turnovers, other mistakes and tough calls against them doomed the Glynn Academy Red Terrors who fell 32-31 on Friday night to Jonesboro in the opening round of the Class AAAAAA state playoffs at Glynn County Stadium. The Terrors lost four fumbles including three before halftime which led to two scores by the Cardinals who built a 26-7 lead in the first two quarters and then held off a valiant effort by Glynn in the second half to get out of Brunswick with the upset-victory. GA was the No. 2 seed from Region 2-AAAAAA and finishes its season with an 8-3 record. The first-round loss was the second in a row for the Terrors who fell at Northside-Warner Robins this time a year ago. Jonesboro, the third seed from Region 3, stayed alive in the playoffs with its first postseason victory since the Cardinals reached the state quarterfinals back in 2015. They are now 8-3 and will move on to play second-ranked Thomas County Central, the Region 1 champion, in the second round next week. “Our kids played hard, but we just stunk it up in the first half,” said GA head coach Rocky Hidalgo. The turnovers, it was just frustrating. It was one of those nights.” Hidalgo normally addresses his team on the field after a win or loss, but the Glynn coach took his team into the locker room after Friday’s game. His talk to the team inside the dressing quarters included a heart-felt salute to the seniors. “They’re a great group of young men,” the coach said. “They’ve been a great group. They never shorted us in the weight room, in practice, on the field. I can’t say enough about them, and they fought their tails off in the second half and gave themselves a chance to win after everything went against them in the first half.” The mishaps started for the Terrors on the game’s opening possession by the Cardinals. Glynn forced a three-and-out, but a roughing the punter penalty allowed Jonesboro to keep possession at the GA 44-yard line. Two plays later, Jonesboro junior quarterback Jamon Jones hit senior receiver Montez Redding for a 45-yard touchdown pass. A two-point conversion run by the Cardinals, who went for two after all of their scores, failed, but the visitors led 6-0 less than two minutes into the game. Glynn answered with an 11-play drive that covered 64 yards and included all rushing attempts by senior Willie Butler who scored from 6 yards to cap the march. Tuck Tucker made the extra-point kick for a 7-6 lead with 4:33 left in the first frame. The Terrors would force a punt the next time Jonesboro had the ball, but a Glynn fumble gave the Cardinals the ball at the GA 29-yard line moments later. The visitors needed only six plays to score their second touchdown on a a third-and-10 play from the 14 as Jones hooked up with sophomore receiver Jontavius Wyman for the six points. The scoring drive by the Cardinals also included a pass interference against Glynn on a third-and-9 play from the 28. The half-the-distance penalty gave the Cardinals a new set of downs at the GA 14. The Glynn sideline didn’t agree with the call nor did the GA fans based on their reaction. Now trailing 12-7 early in the second stanza, the Terrors saw things get worse before they got better. The Cardinals scored a third time after the ball was stripped away from Butler in a pile. The senior workhorse for the Terrors had just gained yardage into Jonesboro territory, and with the pile still moving, Butler gained a few more yards. However, the officials apparently never thought his forward progress had been stopped. Jonesboro’s Jermia Collier, a sophomore linebacker, somehow came away with the ball. He emerged from the pile and ran 54 yards for a touchdown that made it 18-7 with just under three minutes left in the opening half. Still, it got worse for Glynn. A high snap on a GA punt attempt from its own 23 sailed over the head of Tucker who was in punt formation. He chased the ball into the end zone, but tried to punt it out of there. The kick was blocked by the hard-charging Cardinals, and the ball went out of bounds at the Glynn 4, where Jonesboro took over first-and-goal. Jonesboro scored from the one on second down and also converted a pass for two points to make the score 26-7. After halftime, Glynn went to work on cutting into its deficit right way. The Terrors took the kick and drove 74 yards in nine plays with junior quarterback Jayden Ellis crossing the goal stripe from a yard out. The extra-point kick by Tucker made the score 26-14 with less than four minutes expired in the third period. GA would force a punt by the Cardinals on the next series, but Jonesboro got the ball back following another lost fumble on the punt return by Glynn at its own 11. This time, the GA defense bowed its neck and forced a turnover on downs even with Jonesboro getting a second shot at converting on fourth down after an interference penalty on the Terrors. Glynn got the ball at its own 6 on the stop, and the Terrors would drive the the 94 yards to paydirt in eight plays with sophomore runner Da’Sean Howard breaking into open field and scoring from 43 yards to pull Glynn within 26-21 late in the third after the extra-point kick. The Terrors would regain the lead for the first time since the early moments on their next possession which started at their own 20 following a punt to the end zone by the Cardinals. On a third-and-2 play, Ellis kept for first-down yardage along the GA sideline. But instead of going out of bounds, he stayed on his feet along the sideline, and would leap over a defender before going the rest of the way for a 72-yard scoring run that brought the GA faithful to their collective feet and put Glynn in front 29-26 with 8:39 left on the clock. Jonesboro didn’t roll over, though. The Cardinals came right back and went 80 yards in seven plays, getting a 48-yard run to the Glynn 7 by sophomore running back Lucious Murray that led to a pass from there for the go-ahead touchdown which ended up being the game-winner. “They’ve got good athletes. It’s tough to ask (the defense) to shut them out for a half,” Hidalgo said. With 5:52 to go, Glynn was trailing again, 32-29, when it went back on offense at its own 37. The Terrors drove to the Jonesboro 30, but facing a fourth-and-3 from there, a run by Ellis on an option play came up 2 yards short of the line to gain. The turnover on downs forced GA to give the ball back to the Cardinals with 2:02 to play. They came close to losing the ball and possibly even the game when their quarterback who was lined up in the shotgun mishandled a snap that bounced away from his hands. But Jones managed to get the ball back on while going to the ground to reel it in as a Glynn defender also dove for it. The Terrors called their last time out and did actually force Jonesboro to bring its punt team onto the field on fourth down with 11 seconds left. The punter would do as strategically told by his coaches in a timeout and ran out the back of the end zone which gave the Terrors a safety to make for the final score with only four seconds on the clock. Jonesboro did have to kick the ball to the Terrors who tossed it around a couple of times on the return before the game ended. Glynn dominated the yardage battle as the Terrors ran 420 yards while they threw only two passes without a completion in the game. GA rushed for 256 yards after halftime. Jonesboro finished with 88 rushing yards and 185 through the air for 273 total yards. Butler, who eclipsed the 1,000-yard mark during the game, led Glynn with 196 yards on 34 carries. Ellis added 146 yards on 15 attempts and Howard gained 72 yards on six carries. “We ran the ball down their throat, but turned it over,” Hidalgo said. “That was frustrating.”