Saturday, October 22nd, 2022
Riders rally past Bulldogs
By Tom Haines
Photo by Paige Sutter/The Daily Standard
St. Marys' Aiden Hinkle fights through a tackle for the go-ahead touchdown in the final minute against Celina at Grand Lake Health System Field on Friday.
ST. MARYS - Celina took the lead with 10 minutes remaining in the game, but St. Marys wasn't about to be denied.
The Roughriders ran off a nearly five-minute drive to tie the game, then marched down the field for the game-winning touchdown with just under a minute left, and after Celina drove deep into Roughriders territory with seconds remaining, an interception by Brayden Sullivan iced the 28-21 victory in a Western Buckeye League football game at Grand Lake Health System Field on Friday in the 104th meeting of the Battle of Grand Lake.
"Testament to everybody," St. Marys coach Bo Frye said. "They played the hardest I've ever seen them play before in my life, and I've been a part of a lot of them."
St. Marys (8-2) and Celina (6-4) are both headed to the postseason next week, with their playoff berths secured before the game and pairings set to be announced Sunday.
The intensity was at playoff levels in the rivalry game.
Nick Adams led the Bulldogs down the field with sharp passing on the first drive of the third quarter, throwing on nine of the 10 plays and scrambling on the other. He used his legs again to extend a third-down play from the 29, rolling right to evade the unblocked Jace Schaefer and Kayden Sharpe, then reversing and rolling to his left before firing a pass 30 yards through the air to Landen Ackley, who was coming back to the ball.
Ackley took care of the rest, powering through several arm tackles for a touchdown to tie the game at 14 with 8:26 left in the third.
St. Marys' offense, for its part, struggled in the third quarter, producing just 13 yards on a pair of three-and-outs. But after Adams directed another 11-play drive, capped by a lunging grab and a dive over the goal line by Adam Faber on a 16-yard touchdown pass, the Roughriders came to life.
Photo by Paige Sutter/The Daily Standard
Celina's Adam Faber dives across the goal line for a fourth-quarter touchdown in front of St. Marys' Keegan Sharpe at Grand Lake Health System Field on Firday.
St. Marys drove 63 yards in 12 plays, including a fourth-down conversion by Aiden Hinkle, and Hinkle capped it off with a three-yard dive inside right tackle for a touchdown to tie the game with five minutes to play
"We just got into our groove," Frye said. "I guess it comes down to, they're playing nine guys both ways, we're playing none."
Adams' first pass went incomplete, and a second-down sack by Caleb Felver proved too much for the Bulldogs to overcome, handing the ball back to the Roughriders with 3:40 left.
"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog," Frye said of the 5-foot-7 Felver. "It took us a little while this season to realize it. He just refused to get fired - we fired him every week, but we weren't giving him the opportunity."
Starting near midfield, St. Marys marched down and forced Celina to start burning timeouts with just over a minute to go. Hinkle pushed the pile for a third-down conversion with 1:02 left, then powered through a tackle for a six-yard touchdown run five seconds later to put the Roughriders ahead.
Adams found Faber for a fourth-down conversion into St. Marys territory, then threw a 27-yard pass to Ackley over the middle to get to the Roughriders 23. Adams hurried to spike the ball, and Bader called his last timeout with seven seconds left.
Adams rolled right and looked for Zander Jones down the right sideline, but the throw went high and Sullivan made a diving pick to clinch the win.
"We were just trying to get it to the end zone, give a player a chance," Celina coach Brennen Bader said. "He was pressured, and he did a good job just trying to get the ball off."
Photo by Paige Sutter/The Daily Standard
St. Marys' Tristan Gardner (33) is tripped up by Celina quarterback Nick Adams (17) on a second-quarter interception return at Grand Lake Health System Field on Friday.
After an opening touchdown for Celina, back-to-back turnovers in the first half swung the momentum to St. Marys. Celina's Timmy Novitzke forced a fumble near midfield, only for Adams to overthrow Nick Newell in the flat two plays later. The ball landed in the arms of Tristan Gardner, who raced up the left sideline and was only denied a touchdown by Adams' diving tackle at his ankles at the Celina 10.
The Roughriders would not be denied long, as Hinkle took it in two plays later to tie the game with 6:27 to go in the half.
"One-possession games come down to two or three plays," Bader said. "They made just a couple more than we did."
Celina went three-and-out and Keegan Sharpe fell on a muffed punt to keep the ball for St. Marys as a Celina gunner slid past. The Roughriders capitalized, running a 10-play, 70-yard drive, with Hinkle getting the ball on eight plays and punching it in from a yard out to make it 14-7 with 54 seconds to go in the half.
Celina's first score came after a high punt by Schaefer that only went 11 yards, setting up the Bulldogs at the edge of St. Marys territory late in the first quarter. On the first play of the second, Nathan Rammel got the ball on a reverse and launched a pass for Faber down the left sideline, with Keegan Sharpe bringing down Faber a yard short of the end zone.
Landen Ackley took it across on the next play to put Celina ahead 7-0 with 11:30 left in the half.
"Just feel bad for our kids," Bader said. "They played their hearts out, just came up a little short again."
Hinkle finished with 174 yards rushing to add to his WBL-leading total. Adams threw for 194 yards, with Faber picking up 109 yards receiving.
