‘We got the job done.’ Trinity outlasts Frederick Douglass in defensive tug of war in OT.
Not many high school football teams can play the kind of defense that Trinity and Frederick Douglass muster.
That showed Friday night at Trinity’s Marshall Field as the offenses scrapped to a 7-7 tie at the end of regulation of their Class 6A state semifinals game.
But Trinity’s defense had the last word against the Broncos in overtime.
As Douglass prepared to snap its second play of its overtime turn, Trinity’s J.C. Wilson heard one of his assistant coaches warn that Douglass might reverse the field. When Douglass wideout Derion Talbert did just that after the snap, Wilson was ready.
“I was like, ‘There it is! There it is!’ I just grabbed him and let my instinct take over at that point,” Wilson said.
He slung Talbert to the turf for a 13-yard loss. Douglass made up some ground to get it to the 15 on its next play, but Trinity’s Sonny Bratcher Gray deflected Douglass QB Jaxon Strautman’s fourth-down pass at the goal line to end the game.
That’s because, moments earlier Trinity quarterback Zane Johnson completed a short TD pass to Jacob Castelluzzo to open the overtime period and put the Rocks ahead.
The 14-7 victory advanced No. 4 Trinity (11-3) to next Saturday’s Class 6A state championship game where they will face No. 6 Bryan Station, a 24-21 winner over No. 5 Ballard on Friday. That will be a rematch of last year’s region championship won 10-7 by the Defenders, and this year’s season opener, won 36-3 by the Shamrocks.
Friday’s win against Douglass also avenged a 17-14 home loss to the Broncos on Aug. 26.
“We just came in here hungry,” Wilson said. “They beat us here last time, you can’t walk into our house again and beat us.”
Trinity took advantage of exceptional field position after a Douglass punt in the first quarter to score the game’s opening touchdown, a 9-yard pass from Johnson to Jeremiah Lynn for a 7-0 lead at the 5:46 mark.
But the Rocks could not solve the Douglass defense after that, punting five times, turning it over on downs once and having a fourth quarter field goal blocked.
The Douglass offense didn’t fare much better. Brady McEnaney‘s interception thwarted the Broncos’ best drive of the first half. A fumble on Trinity’s 10-yard line with 4:35 left in the fourth quarter looked like the best the Broncos could do in the second half.
But Douglass’ defense forced a quick punt that gave its offense one more chance with 2:52 remaining.
Douglass embarked on a nine-play, 50-yard drive capped by Strautman’s 11-yard touchdown pass to Talbert. Strautman bootlegged right and then turned and threw back to the left across the field to a wide-open Talbert in the end zone with two defenders trailing behind. Cooper Ranvier’s successful extra point tied the game at 7-7 with 13 seconds left. Trinity knelt out the clock to force overtime.
“We had to stay in there and keep fighting,” Trinity coach Jay Cobb said. Talking to his players before the start of overtime, Cobb said, “‘Look, you’re still where you want to be,’ is what I told them. And we had to go out and execute in the overtime and we did.
“You saw two really good defenses playing tonight and it came down to turnovers as it always does, and execution. We didn’t play great, but we got the job done. That’s all that matters.”
Douglass (8-5) jumped up to Class 6A this year after winning last season’s Class 5A state championship. Coach Nathan McPeek could not find enough takers to fill out a full 10-game regular season schedule for 2023 and took on nationally ranked Archbishop Hoban out of Akron, Ohio, and Cathedral out of Indianapolis in an effort to raise his team’s level of play.
But Douglass entered the postseason at No. 9 in the RPI Standings as a result of their win-loss record and the RPI formula’s poor valuation of out-of-state opponents. Nevertheless, Douglass won its fifth consecutive region championship last week.
“I’m really proud of our guys,” McPeek said. “They had to go through a lot of adversity this year.”
The Douglass community was also dealt a heavy blow during the week with the tragic death of former football, basketball and baseball standout Cameron Dunn, who graduated last spring. Many players had Dunn’s No. 3 written on some of their gear Friday.
“Obviously, this week was very tough,” McPeek said. “Our prayers are with his family and with these players that were really close to him. He played for us for five years. He was a big part of our state championship last year. We’re going to miss him.”
This story was originally published November 25, 2023 at 8:15 AM.
