The cheers coming from the Dominion Titans’ locker room were louder than bullhorns, echoing through the warm summer night after their nail-biting 21-14 overtime win on September 21. Just one room over, the Heritage Pride stood in near silence, pondering what might have been if they had gained just one more yard.

The game started out perfectly for Dominion, as junior quarterback Aidan Dolan spun out of tackles en route to a 72-yard touchdown run on the Titans’ second drive. It was a great start to the game for Dominion, who needed one after trailing in halftime in all four of its previous games.

The score remained stagnant until the second half when junior wide receiver Trey Hayes extended the Titan lead. Hayes returned a punt almost squatting, before squirting through the tackles of two Heritage defenders. He then turned upfield and cut to the right side before being seemingly stopped in a huge pileup of Dominion and Heritage players. Somehow, he escaped out of that and scored a 70-yard punt return touchdown.

“I just got to take this to the house,” Hayes said. “I saw the big dude on me and said fear no one, took him straight up.”

For most of the game, the Dominion defense limited Heritage junior quarterback Brett Johnson and the rest of the Pride offense through the air. On multiple occasions, Johnson was forced to escape the pocket and seemed to have a case of happy feet. He missed many passes and was shaky in the first half before settling down in the fourth quarter.

“Early on, they were doing some things coverage-wise that hurt us in executing some plays,” Kevin Copley, the Heritage interim head coach,said.

With his team down 14-0 with not much time left, Johnson led his team down the field, capping it off with a 10-yard touchdown pass to senior wideout, Gio Seigler. After a Dominion punt placed Heritage at their own 6-yard line with less than 7 minutes left in the fourth quarter, the Pride offense struck quickly.

Johnson dropped back and fired a dart to Seigler on the left side of the field on a curl route. Seigler turned away from the Dominion defender and sprinted for 94 yards and a Heritage touchdown that tied the game.

Neither team was able to break the tie in regulation and the game went to overtime. The Titans got the ball first and on their first play from scrimmage on the 10-yard line, junior running back, Steve Zegbe took a handoff up the middle and ran into the end zone to give Dominion the lead.

“I saw a big hole, and as I was running to the end zone I saw Heritage coming,” Zegbe said. “I just lowered my shoulder and kept moving.”

Needing a touchdown to extend the game, Johnson and the Pride were left with a 4th-and-goal from the one yard. He lined up in the shotgun and drove forward on a QB draw but came up just short as the Titans ran off the field in jubilation.

“If you can’t get one yard on the goal line, if you can’t get one yard from the run, you probably don’t deserve to win, and that’s what happened,” Copley said.

Dominion head coach Karl Buckwalter said, “It’s a roller coaster; it’s unbelievable. We said in the beginning, we told [our guys] it’s going to come down to tackling and stops. And it did. We faced adversity, we stepped up and to stop a team on the one-yard line is huge, so we can’t be prouder of our kids.”

The Titans, now 3-2, will travel to Riverside High School, who are 4-1, on September 28 in another Dulles District matchup.