The Forrest Middle School Rockets hosted Middle Tennessee Christian School (MTCS) in a weather related makeup game Monday night at the Murrey E. Holton Memorial Field in Chapel Hill and it was the Cougars who prevailed, 12-8.

The contest was tightly contested the entire game as both defenses came up with several big stops.

The Rockets lost the turnover battle 3-1 with two of the miscues happening inside the Cougars’ 10-yard, negating two scoring opportunities for Forrest.

Forrest kicked off to MTCS to start the game and held the Cougars in check to force a punt.

After Micah McClendon executed a fair catch on the MTCS punt, the Rockets started at their own 40-yard line and went to work on the ground with consecutive runs by Tayton Swift, Liam Bell, and McClendon that moved the rock to the MTCS 38-yard line.

Forrest was fortunate to keep the ball when Riley Durbin recovered an FMS fumble and the Rockets ran the ball three more times to the MTCS 6-yard line before Gabe Howell jumped on another FMS fumble with 17 seconds remaining in the first quarter.

FMS stopped the Cougars for no gain to end the first quarter, but on the first play of the second quarter, MTCS quarterback Ethan Adams took off for a 90-yard touchdown run.

The 2-point conversion pass was no good and the Cougars led 6-0 with 7:44 left in the first half.

The Rockets started their next drive at the MTCS 30-yard line and marched down the field with the big play coming when Rockets’ quarterback Tilden Copeland found a wide open Codi Smith for a huge gain down to the MTCS 16-yard line.

On third-and-three from the MTCS 9-yard line it looked like Forrest had tied the game on a Burchell TD run, but a false start negated the score and the Rockets were stuffed on fourth down with 4:01 remaining in the first half.

The Rockets’ defense came up big with a three-and-out stop and took over at their own 41-yard line with 2:55 left in the first half.

Copeland found a wide open Smith on another big hookup on first down that went to the MTCS 12-yard line and three plays later, Burchell found the end zone for the score.

McClendon dashed left for the 2-point conversion run and FMS had the lead at 8-6 with 1:12 left in the first half.

The Cougars failed to move the ball on their final possession of the first half and the Rockets took the two point lead to the locker room.

Forrest went three-and-out to begin the second half and the Cougars were stopped on their first drive when the Rockets sniffed out a fake punt attempt and took over at the midfield stripe.

FMS ran the ball five times to the MTCS 5-yard line and tried to pass for the touchdown, but the pass was deflected and caught on the rebound for an interception by Eli Wilson, who ran to the Forrest 25-yard line on the return.

The Rockets held on defense, forcing a three-and-out punt on the last play of third quarter, but fumbled the ball back to MTCS on the first play of the fourth quarter.

The Cougars came up with a razzle-dazzle play on second down when they pulled off an option pass by Grant Haussin to Daniel Floyd down to the FMS 3-yard line.

Two plays later, Adams ran a keeper into the end zone to put MTCS up 12-8 with 6:16 left in the ballgame.

The Cougar defense stuffed Forrest on four straight plays and burned a little over two minutes off the clock before giving the ball back to the Rockets with 2:24 remaining in the game.

Swift gave FMS some hope on a fourth-down-and-24 play when he caught a pass and ran to midfield and Copeland spiked the ball with 8 seconds left, but the Rockets ran out of time and could not score.

FMS hosts Eagleville Thursday night for middle school homecoming with kickoff slated for 6:30 p.m.

MTCS 0 6 0 6-12

FMS 0 8 0 0-0

Scoring Plays

Second Quarter

MTCS-Ethan Adams 90-yard run, 2-pt. conversion pass Incomplete, 7:44.

Forrest-Brenton Burchell 1-yard run, Micah McClendon 2-pt conversion run, 1:12.

Fourth Quarter

MTCS-Adams 14-yard run, 2-pt. conversion pass Incomplete, 6:12.