South Medford junior quarterback Makana Brown scrambles for a first down Friday night against Grants Pass at Spiegelberg Stadium in Medford.

Making their third trip to Salem already this football season, South Medford nearly was able to pull off an upset of No. 7-ranked Sprague with a strong effort Thursday night but the Olympians scored a go-ahead touchdown with 1 ½ minutes remaining to eke out a 28-24 victory.

The Panthers had scored 17 straight points to erase a 16-7 deficit but couldn’t fend off a fourth-quarter comeback effort by Sprague in the South/Central Football Conference matchup.

“It was a great high school football game,” said South Medford head coach Bill Singler. “It went back-and-forth; one team would have momentum and then the other team would grab momentum. It was just one of those kinds of games where it was like the team who had the ball last won.”

The Panthers (3-3, 3-2 SCFC) actually had good field position to start their final drive at their own 42-yard line, but a first-down sack of quarterback Makana Brown sent them backwards. A second-down heave down the middle of the field toward Ajani Ingram was easily taken in for an interception by Trayton Futi to seal the outcome for the Olympians (7-0, 6-0).

“It was a hard-fought game and a tough loss but a great effort,” said Singler. “You hate to come out on the losing end but I hope these kids understand that not all is lost and there is a lot gained because of how tough they played against a very quality opponent on the road.”

There certainly will be more than a few what-ifs for the Panthers to ponder from Thursday’s outing.

Sprague scored its first touchdown on a fake punt where the ball was directly snapped to Carter Lovell, who found paydirt from 57 yards out after the Panthers all but left the right side of the field unoccupied until a late scramble.

South Medford was also stopped short at the goal line as the final seconds of the first half wound down and with no timeouts had to rush out and settle for a field goal instead of a potential touchdown attempt.

There were also a couple times the Panthers’ defense allowed big plays after Sprague was well behind the chains in the fourth quarter.

Maybe the hardest pill to swallow were the penalties that piled up and kept South Medford’s offense from creating more scoring opportunities, as well as a chance to potentially run out the clock after Sprague had marched 95 yards to score and move within 24-22 at the 5:49 mark in the final frame.

On its ensuing possession, South Medford faced a third-and-7 at its own 33-yard line but seemingly had picked up the first down when Ingram slipped through the defense on a reverse. That play, however, was called back on a holding penalty.

The Panthers were able to get all but 3 yards back on a run by Bridger Foss but then had to punt the ball back to Sprague with 3:39 still on the clock.

“If we make that first down, who knows maybe we can run that clock down and force them to use their timeouts and change field position to make them have to go a longer distance,” said Singler. “A lot of things could happen but it didn’t go our way and that was a tough one.”

The Panthers kept the Olympians from gaining ground for two plays before quarterback Dukatti Witherspoon rolled left and threw back to Futi for a pivotal 42-yard gain to the South 31. Two plays later on third down, Ingram was called for pass interference on a throw to the end zone, and that’s when Kenya Johnson took the next handoff 13 yards for the go-ahead TD.

“We needed our 30 points,” said Singler. “We’ve been averaging around 28 or 30 and we needed one more touchdown, and we just couldn’t get it.”

The ending spoiled a solid comeback effort by the Panthers themselves after they fell behind 16-7 but answered with a 2-yard TD run by Kellen Lefebvre and, following an interception by Kameron Rague, an 18-yard field goal by Jaeden Thonstad to take a 17-16 lead into the break.

The lead might have been more on a promising final drive of the first half for the Panthers but they found themselves without any timeouts as Brown did well to patiently put them into great scoring position behind key connections to Ingram.

On third-and-9 with 28 seconds remaining, Brown pulled the ball down and raced right toward the end zone but was hit just prior to reaching the goal line by Futi. Had it been a college game, the effort was close enough to consider a video replay as to whether Brown crossed the goal line, but with the clock ticking and none of that potential, South had to run on the field goal unit.

“Gosh darn it we didn’t have any timeouts left and things are happening fast,” said Singler. “We just couldn’t afford to go down there and not get any points. It looked like Makana had scored from the press box but they didn’t give it to him and so they spotted it on the 1 and if we would’ve run a play and gotten stopped then we were done, we wouldn’t have had another play. We made the field goal and went into the half one point ahead and felt good about ourselves.”

Brown was able to score on a 33-yard touchdown run in the third quarter — capped by a diving effort into the end zone to make sure this time — as South Medford built a 24-16 advantage.

The Panthers had previously gotten a leaping effort in the end zone by Michael Duclos for a 26-yard score on fourth down in the first quarter, and saw Cade Siewert join Rague in grabbing an interception. Isa De La Torre also recovered a fumble by Johnson when the ball was poked out by Jacob Dalton to halt a drive by Sprague at the Panthers’ 20-yard line.

“I was really proud of our effort throughout the game and the kids battling through adversity,” said Singler, whose squad still has one more Salem trip on the schedule. “We got down early and then we came roaring back and made some plays. We didn’t start well but we did get through it. I thought our kids kept competing against a team that can throw and run and is a very well-coached team.”

South Medford 7 10 7 0 — 24

Sprague 9 7 0 12 — 28

S — Lovell 57 run (Farwell kick)

SM — Duclos 26 pass from Brown (J. Thonstad kick)

S — Safety, Lefebvre tackled in end zone

S — Witherspoon 7 run (Farwell kick)

SM — Lefebvre 2 run (J. Thonstad kick)

SM — FG Thonstad 18

SM — Brown 33 run (J. Thonstad kick)

S — Johnson 7 pass from Witherspoon (pass failed)

S — Johnson 13 run (run failed)