In a game which featured dueling Mr. Football finalists, explosive offenses, and the background question of whether Alcoa’s string of state titles could survive moving up in classification, Friday’s Class 4A state semifinal was ultimately decided in the simplest way possible: one team made big plays, and the other was denied every chance to make them.

Nobody embodied that divide more than Alcoa junior receiver Jamir Dean, who turned a tight, physical matchup into a track meet. With catches of 72, 19, and 86 yards, Dean authored one of the most devastating halves you’ll see in a state semifinal, powering Alcoa to a 35-7 win at Burley Stadium and into the 4A championship game 11 a.m. against Pearl-Cohn (10-4) next Saturday at Chattanooga’s Finley Stadium.

“It was part of the game plan because we knew (Greeneville star Zaydyn Anderson) was going to follow me,” Dean said. “So we tried to open up a little bit. I just ran out (the first time), but the second time (an 86-yard bomb from junior quarterback Thomas Manu) I knew I wasn’t going to get caught.”

He wasn’t.

And Greeneville (12-2) never recovered.

Across a decade of dominance, Alcoa has produced state champions, head-turning athletes, and defensive efforts that still get talked about years later. But this performance — on the road for the third straight week, against a Greeneville team with Anderson (a UT commit) and dual-threat quarterback Caden Baugh — carried something different. Not bigger stakes necessarily, but heavier expectations. Moving from 3A to 4A wasn’t supposed to be seamless, and the Tornadoes heard the whispers.

“We moved up. People said we couldn’t do it — now look at us,” Dean said.

Look at them, indeed.

After beating overmatched Cherokee in the first round Alcoa has flattened Upperman, Red Bank, and now Greeneville by a combined 122-48. But Friday was the full Alcoa experience: relentless running, suffocating secondary play, and an offense that can hit home runs from anywhere on the field.

The game boiled down to three snaps — all involving Dean, all in the first half, and all swift and brutal.

The first came with Alcoa up 7-0 and Greeneville still settling in. On third down, junior quarterback Thomas Manu spotted Dean breaking loose on a deep crossing route. The ball arrived on stride, Dean split the seam, and suddenly Alcoa was at the Greeneville 6-yard line after a 72-yard strike. Two plays later, it was 14-0 on Manu’s 4-yard keeper.

The second was stroke of genuis — a 19-yard halfback pass touchdown that turned a punishing drive into a three-score lead. After pounding away on fourth-and-short, Alcoa pulled the defense downhill again, got the ball to running back Micah Jones, and watched Dean slip behind a frozen secondary for a 21-0 advantage.

The third play ended whatever suspense remained. Greeneville had just forced a pair of stops and needed one break to climb back into the game. Instead, Manu dropped back early in the second quarter and launched a deep throw that hit Dean in stride for an 86-yard touchdown, the longest offensive play of Alcoa’s season.

On those three plays. Dean had 177 yards and two touchdowns. More importantly, Greeneville — a team built on explosive plays — had zero.

“It was just play with your eyes and play with depth, because he’s a fast kid,” Alcoa junior Demauri Dubose said of defending Anderson. “We were just taught to play that way and we’d be all right.”

They were better than all right. Dubose shadowed Anderson most of the time and won leverage nearly every time. Greeneville’s bread-and-butter — vertical shots to Anderson — never materialized. Baugh — a 1,000-yard rusher — never got going, either.

“We manned with our best corner (Dubose) and he took him out,” Dean said. “He was playing with leverage because all they do is attack the deep balls, and he was going deep.”

Dubose ran for 109 yards; Jones had 100. Manu was 6-of-8 for 203 yards.

Without chunk plays, Greeneville had to grind out every yard, and Alcoa simply didn’t allow it. The Greene Devils entered averaging nearly 47 points per game. At halftime, they had 98 yards and zero points, and didn’t cross midfield until late in the third quarter.

“It could have been different if we could have gotten a couple of stops either after halftime or before the half, or if we could have put some points on the board before the half,” Anderson said. “It was just a bad game on our part.”

For all the fireworks on offense, the quiet story was Alcoa’s secondary — the group that allowed the Tornadoes to tilt the field early and stay aggressive throughout.

“I’ve got some of the best secondary coaches in the state coaching them up, and we’ve got some very good athletes in the secondary,” head coach Brian Nix said. “We were going to make it hard on them — especially when we got up — to get (Anderson) the ball.”

Hard might be underselling it. Greeneville had six first-half punts, an interception, and multiple drives stalled by sacks. Baugh’s legs got him a handful of first downs, but nearly every downfield attempt was contested or walled off entirely.

Anderson finished with two catches for 17 yards.

“After we started just banging on them in the first quarter, they started to give up,” Dubose said. “Coach always says they’ll break before we break, so we just go out there and play all four quarters.”

As dominant as the passing game was early, the second half belonged to Alcoa’s ground attack. Micah Jones opened with runs of 18, 12, 5, and 2 before Manu ripped off a 19-yard keeper. Dubose followed with a 24-yard touchdown run to push the lead to 35-0 with 9:22 left in the third.

“With the offense, me and Micah, we complement each other,” Dubose said. “I get down there and he can punch, or I can punch. We just really run hard.”

They ran for 311 yards by night’s end — the kind of tally that crushes a defense’s will and shortens the game into a formality.

Greeneville finally broke the shutout on an 80-yard touchdown run by senior Maddox Bishop, but even that didn’t alter the tenor of the night. Alcoa had dictated the type of game played, and Greeneville never got to be the team it had been all season.

“We’ve never in the playoffs had to play this,” Nix said. “You play Anderson County Week (11), then two weeks later you go on the road at Upperman, then you go on the road to Red Bank, and then you come here to Greeneville. It’s helped us in the past that we’ve played these teams before, and we’ve played a tough regular-season schedule.”

“Having to do it on the road, week after week, I can’t compliment our kids enough,” he added. “They didn’t allow the side stuff to hurt them.”

And now, the Tornadoes — owners of 10 straight Class 3A state titles — are one win from the program’s first Class 4A championship.

If they get it, nights like this will be remembered as the reason why. They didn’t just win a semifinal on the road. They neutralized a 1211 powerhouse, hit home runs from every angle, and shut down one of the state’s best passing games with precision and swagger.

Big plays made. Big plays denied. That’s the formula that brought Alcoa to the brink of its next championship.

And Friday night, it was the only formula that mattered.

Article written by Dean Fox/5Star Preps. To read more on area high school sports or to see photo galleries, videos, stat leaders, etc, visit 5StarPreps.com — and use promo code New2025 for 30% off your first year or month subscription.

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