40-38 – for an entire year that score haunted players on the Robert Bateman Timberwolves senior varsity football team. On Dec. 4, 2021, Bateman lost by that score in overtime to the Carson Graham Eagles in the coastal championship game. That crushing loss was all the returning players thought about.
For quarterback Nolan Watrin, he looked at the score every single day. Watrin taped 40-38 to the ceiling above his bed. A day didn’t go by where when he went to bed or woke up, opened his eyes and spotted that score.