MORRILTON -- A Morrilton junior's big game lifted the Devil Dogs to an important home win.
Morrilton defeated White Hall 28-25 at Devil Dog Stadium, handing the Bulldogs their second-straight one-score road loss.
Junior Andrew Rhoden scored all four Devil Dog touchdowns. He recovered a blocked punt in the end zone on White Hall's opening drive, then caught 3 touchdown passes from quarterback Maddox Berry.
Rhoden finished with 3 catches for 137 yards for Morrilton (5-2, 4-1 in 5A-Central). Berry completed 10 of 24 passes for 222 yards.
White Hall coach Jason Mitchell said his team didn't play well coming off the bye week.
"I just don't think we were mentally prepared to play," Mitchell said. "We still had a chance to win at the end, but you can't come into a game mentally unprepared and also not physically prepared on my part. It's my fault. During the bye week, we didn't do a good job practicing. Last week, we didn't have a very good week of practice, but you have to give it to a good Morrilton team."
White Hall quarterback Noah Smith completed 16 of 31 passes for 200 yards and 2 touchdowns.
The Bulldogs (3-3, 2-2) led 17-14 late in the third quarter, but Rhoden caught touchdown passes of 43 and 81 yards to take a 28-17 lead with 8:03 to play.
White Hall rattled off a 9-play, 70-yard touchdown drive to get back in the game. Smith scored on a 7-yard run, and senior running back Jayden Smith ran in the 2-point conversion.
Mitchell said the Bulldogs will always play hard.
"They never gave up," Mitchell said. "Of course, Morrilton never gave up. They just had a few more plays than we did, but I'm always proud of the kids and the way they fight."
Morrilton struck first on a special teams play 1:13 into the game when Timothy Mallett blocked a White Hall punt and Rhoden recovered it in the end zone for a touchdown.
The score remained 7-0 until the late stages of the first half. Zane Davis got the Bulldogs on the board with a 25-yard field goal. White Hall's defense forced a fumble on Morrilton's next drive and Savon Slater recovered it for the Bulldogs, but White Hall gave it back on a strip-sack moments later. Morrilton's Peyton Havner recovered it.
Mitchell said the Bulldogs needed the bye week to get healthy but started slow Friday night.
"We were slow on offense," Mitchell said. "We finally got going a little bit, and the defense played so much, I think they wore down towards the end, a couple of big plays in there. Just getting back to game speed, and against a hard-fought team like this, we weren't rusty. We just didn't play very well."
The Devil Dogs scored four plays later on a 13-yard pass from Berry to Rhoden to extend their lead, but White Hall answered in two plays as Smith found Chris Joe behind the defense for a 45-yard score. Both touchdowns came in the final minute of the first half, and Morrilton led 14-9 at halftime.
Two touchdown passes from Smith gave White Hall the lead before Morrilton closed things out in the fourth quarter.