“I’m not worried.”
Dawson glanced over to see that Cam had drifted near.
“Do I look worried?” Dawson asked.
“A little, yeah. I thought Aidan’s eyes were going to pop out of his head when that guy wrestled that pass away from Mo.”
Aidan’s expressionhadbeen a little funny, and it would have been even funnier if the Cowboys hadn’t scored on the very next play.
Dawson shrugged. “They’re gonna get some points on the board.”
“Short-ish field goal for you,” Cam pointed out. He knew how much Dawson yearned to prove himself. And how that proof wasn’t for anyone else but him.
“They’re gonna get a touchdown,” Dawson said confidently.
Aidan must have agreed, because the next play he handed the ball off to Jaden, who made a beautiful cut and then another, spinning right into the end zone.
“See?” Dawson said, after he and Cam finished high-fiving about it. “Told you.”
“He gave the ball to Jaden because of that fumble, yeah?” Cam asked.
“Something like that,” Dawson said. Jaden had gotten his redemption. Mo had caught two important passes on that drive, getting his.
But now Dawson wanted his own.
And it wasn’t kicking extra points or thirty-five-yard field goals.
Still, nobody was complaining when after that disastrous first quarter, the Thunder went into the locker room at the half tied fourteen all.
During most games the tone on the sideline in the second half had been relaxed. Jovial. In several of the games they’d played this year, they’d been leading by enough points that Wes and some of the other backups had been in by the end of the game.
But not today.
The Thunder traded field goals with the Cowboys, Dawson heading out and not kicking the longer field goal he’d wanted to try, but instead a forty-yarder. Not a gimmie, by any means, but not the fifty-plus he still wanted.
The third quarter ticked to a close, the score still tied. Cam was even getting more work than normal, the Thunder punting on several drives. But he was steady and excellent, both times pinning the Cowboys against the ten-yard line.
Every time Cam came back to the sideline after a great punt, Dawson left his space bubble, giving him a high five and a few words of encouragement. He was tense, but focused, a feeling that seemed to extend to everyone on the sideline.
It was an unspoken assumption that whoever made the worst—or last—mistake would be the team to lose this game, and all fifty-two members of the Thunder were united and determined it wouldn’t be on them.
Midway through the fourth quarter, Aidan led the Thunder offense on a tough, gritty drive. Jaden routinely making five-yard runs out of plays that shouldn’t have gained him more than a yard or two, at best. Aidan made a handful of great throws, and Mo made at least one spectacular diving catch that was bound to end up on at least a few highlight reels.
It wasn’t the normal kind of offensive fireworks the Toronto Thunder displayed but Coach Robertson was always talking about how teams who wanted to take it all, at the end of the season, had to win all different kinds of games.
This was definitely different from their usual, but maybe that was okay.
Aidan ended up taking the ball himself, running it in the last few yards, to get the touchdown, and that felt representative of the whole game. It was probably really good that he was going to get a good break after this. Probably good forallof them, Dawson realized, his own neck stiff and tense with the anxiety, no matter how he tried to loosen it.
Up seven, the game headed into the last five minutes.
It was up to the Thunder defense to preserve the lead, but the Cowboys seemed determined to not let the Thunder come into their stadium and come from behind and win the game.
They might not have had as many wins, but they still had offensive weapons, and they used them.
Dawson watched with disbelief as they converted a third and twenty-four, after a Nate sack and another tackle for loss.
There were forty-five seconds left in the game when the Cowboys tied it up.
