Bryan Station starts well, but falls short to mighty Trinity in Class 6A finals
Although Bryan Station initially got off to a bit of a shaky start against Trinity in their 2023 UK HealthCare Sports Medicine Class 6A State Football Finals championship game at Kroger Field on Saturday, it couldn’t have asked for a better first quarter.
After a few bad snaps on their opening series helped set up a Trinity field goal, the Defenders answered with two nice drives around a Trinity fumble to score the game’s first two touchdowns. Both came on short TD runs by junior running back Kalen “Jaws” Washington to help Bryan Station take a 14-3 lead into the second quarter.
Unfortunately for the Defenders, it was all Trinity after that in a 41-20 Shamrocks victory.
“It’s a lot to keep up with Trinity over four quarters,” Bryan Station coach Phillip Hawkins said after his team’s loss to the Louisville private school that got its record 28th state championship. “They just throw more guys at you and more guys at you. We’re trying to grow our program, and we’ve got ourselves pretty far. We’re just a little short on guys inside on the offensive and defensive front, and we couldn’t manage the game the way we wanted to.”
Fake punt was ‘a blow’
Two Clinton Sansbury touchdown runs and two Carson Hilbert field goals staked Trinity to a 20-14 halftime lead. The Shamrocks got a Dane Murrow interception in the second quarter to help offset their first quarter fumble.
As Trinity’s drive to open the third quarter stalled, it looked like an opportunity for Bryan Station to keep pace. The Shamrocks lined up to punt on fourth-and-2 from their own 39-yard line.
That’s when Sansbury took a direct snap on a fake punt and gashed Bryan Station’s special teams unit for a 48-yard gain. Two plays later Trinity quarterback Zane Johnson found Lucas Sasser in the end zone for a 27-14 lead at the 8:51 mark of the third quarter.
Hawkins admitted he should have called timeout ahead of the play because his punt return team didn’t have some of the personnel it was supposed to.
“We just got caught, and it was demoralizing to see them get that first down. You cannot give them an inch,” Hawkins said. “It was a blow.”
Trinity coach Jay Cobb knew the fake opportunity would be there.
“Any time we see a team that has two return guys, (the fake) is alive for us,” Cobb said. “We work on three or four different ways to block it … and Clint does a good job of seeing it.”
Sansbury got word that the fake was on as they lined up.
“And I was like ‘All right, let’s go,’” Sansbury said. “Brady (McEnaney) snapped it to me and I saw nothing but green grass.”
The fake punt play came in the middle of five straight scoring drives for the Shamrocks that helped put the game away.
Sansbury, a senior, racked up 155 yards rushing and three scores while Johnson, a freshman, completed 15 of 23 passes for 175 yards and the Sasser TD connection. Ryan Smith tagged on an 11-yard TD run in the fourth quarter.
One legacy affirmed, another started
For Trinity (12-3), the win restores the Shamrocks to what they feel is their rightful place atop Kentucky’s Class 6A. The win gives Cobb his first state championship as head coach after five as defensive coordinator under former coach Bob Beatty who retired after the ‘Rocks’ last crown in 2020.
“They preach legacy at Trinity. And the one thing we needed to complete our legacy was this,” said senior defensive lineman Nate Tronzo, who recorded three sacks. “We did it. We got here and prepared and we played well.”
Washington scored his third touchdown of the game in the fourth quarter and finished with 75 rushing yards for Bryan Station, while senior quarterback Trenton Cutwright passed for 175 yards to go with 25 yards rushing.
“We kind of let up a little bit, and it just goes to show that if you let up on this game on the big stage that anything can happen,” Cutwright said. “Trinity’s a good team. You’ve got to play four quarters against them or it’ll be a bad game.”
Bryan Station (11-4) reached its first finals since 1999 when a team quarterbacked by JT Haskins lost in overtime to St. Xavier. Haskins is now the Defenders’ defensive coordinator. His oldest son, JT Haskins Jr. has been been a four-year starter and two-way standout during the program’s resurgence.
“It hurts really bad to see that we came short,” Haskins Jr. said. “But we just had a really tight brotherhood, and I’ve loved playing at Bryan Station for these past four years. It’s been amazing.”
As head coach, Hawkins’ 41-12 record for the Pride of the Northside includes two district titles, two region titles and this state finals appearance, only the fourth for a school that won it all in 1971. He took over a program that went 3-8 in 2019.
“I think when I took the job at Bryan Station, there was no expectations, because it hadn’t been the program it needed to be,” Hawkins said. “So, the fact that these kids won 41 games in four years and found their way to the state championship says a lot about these young men and also what we’re trying to do at Bryan Station. We want Bryan Station to be here every year.”
State finals attendance up slightly
Despite chilly and drizzly conditions for part of Friday and most of Saturday, the KHSAA state football championships surpassed last year’s attendance total for all six games with 43,478 fans turning out at Kroger Field.
That’s the best figure since before the pandemic when 51,844 attended the 2019 state championships and up slightly from last year’s 42,495.
Friday night’s Class 4A title game between Boyle County and Covington Catholic drew the most fans with 8,406, an improvement over the 7,129 who watched Boyle take on Corbin last year.
The other attendance figures were: Class A: 6,207; Class 2A: 7,432; Class 3A: 6,205; Class 5A: 6,299; Class 6A: 9,029.
This story was originally published December 2, 2023 at 10:09 PM.
