Arlington avoids drama vs. rival Arlington Martin to unravel convoluted playoff picture

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ARLINGTON — The playoff picture in District 8-6A was convoluted to say the least entering the final week of the regular season.

Three different three-way ties and one four-way tie were possible to determine playoff berths and seeding. There were three scenarios in which a coin flip could have decided the district’s final team in the postseason.

A lot of scoreboard watching was taking place online as games were going on Thursday night, and Arlington coach Scott Peach had assistants keeping him updated on how South Grand Prairie and Haltom were doing in their games.

But Arlington took all of the suspense away and made sure no points tiebreakers or calculators were necessary to decide its playoff fate.

Arlington scored points on its first eight drives and took the easiest path to the playoffs by simply beating rival Arlington Martin 49-31 at UT-Arlington’s Maverick Stadium. Three-star SMU pledge Isaiah Robertson had 176 yards combined rushing and receiving and ran for two touchdowns and Jamar Burton added 126 yards and a score on the ground as Arlington (7-3, 5-2) made the playoffs for the 10th straight season and 16th time in 17 years, earning 8-6A’s No. 2 seed in the Class 6A Division II bracket.

“Our motto is leave a legacy,” said Peach, whose team tied Haltom for second place in 8-6A. “I started it about 15 years ago. What we say is you have to protect the legacy at Arlington High School, and the way you do it is we’ve got to get in the playoffs. It’s been an amazing run.”

Martin (3-7, 3-4), which had a shot to make the postseason had it won, tied for fifth in 8-6A and saw its streak of making the playoffs end at 18 years. Martin had been the king of Arlington ISD football, winning five consecutive outright district championships during a 36-game district winning streak, but it missed the playoffs for the first time since 2005.

In a matchup of two schools that are 6 miles apart, Martin had beaten Arlington five years in a row before Thursday, winning by an average of 31 points and including a 58-21 rout last year. But Arlington scored three consecutive touchdowns in the second half to turn a 28-24 lead into a 49-24 advantage and increased its lead in the all-time series to 22-18-1.

Turnover belt! See photos as Arlington holds off rival Arlington Martin

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“We made up our mind when we came in last Saturday morning as a football team that we weren’t going to rely on anybody else,” Peach said. “We were going to get this done ourselves, and that’s the thing I’m most proud of.”

Robertson is an extraordinary wide receiver, but he showed why he is appropriately ranked among the top athletes in national recruiting rankings. He scored on runs of 2 and 28 yards, rushed for 92 yards, had seven catches for 84 yards and even hurdled a defender on a running play while splitting his time between receiver and Wildcat quarterback.

Robertson is Arlington’s version of San Francisco 49ers dynamic playmaker Deebo Samuel, a Pro Bowl receiver who coined the term “wide back” for his position because he is also a prolific runner. Robertson has scored 21 touchdowns on the season — 14 rushing, five receiving and two on punt returns.

“Isaiah Robertson is an unbelievable football player,” Peach said. “Making catches, running the football at the quarterback position and just his leadership has really impacted this entire football team.”

Arlington rallied from an early 14-6 deficit with help from a 25-point second quarter and took a 28-21 lead into halftime. Burton scored on a 32-yard run with 4:09 left in the first half for a 21-14 Arlington lead, then Abe Otokiti scored on an 18-yard run with 29 seconds left in the half.

Otokiti’s touchdown capped a five-play, 75-yard drive that included a spectacular leaping catch by Robertson on a 33-yard pass from Coleman Cravens that moved the ball to the Martin 18. Martin had tied it 21-all with just 1:04 left in the half on a 31-yard touchdown pass from Hunter Squires to Brody Williams.

Squires threw only eight passes in the first half but also had a 30-yard scoring pass to Daylon Cobb. Former Martin head coach Bob Wager, now the director of high school relations at TCU, was watching the game from behind the end zone and congratulated Cobb after he scored.

Martin cut Arlington’s lead to 28-24 on the first drive of the third quarter on a 31-yard field goal from Tristan Naifeh, but that was as close as it would get. Arlington answered with three straight touchdowns for a 49-24 lead, starting with 5-yard touchdown run by Cravens after a fourth-and-7 conversion on an 11-yard pass from Cravens to Robertson, followed by a 50-yard touchdown pass from Cravens to Tayshaun Goston and a 28-yard touchdown run by Robertson.

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