Back-to-Back!

Back-to-Back!

By BRENDAN BURNETT-KURIE

There were 528 minutes of play in Douglas’ 2009 Championship season.

The Bearcats trailed for none of them.

“No one even touched us,” senior Houston Falkenburg said. “We’re like royalty. We’re like gods. They bow at our thrones.”

Cody was the latest team to feel the wrath of Douglas’ mythology. The Bearcats crushed the Broncs 44-14 in the 3A State Football Championship Game at War Memorial Stadium in Laramie, Nov. 14. The dominating win – Douglas scored the first 25 points – demonstrated the same supremacy that led to an undefeated 11-0 season that featured 10 straight wins by at least 25 points.

“I always wanted to coach a team like this and I got the chance this year,” head coach Jay Rhoades said. “They never really had to face any adversity and that’s pretty uncommon in high school football. These guys found a way to do that.”

“Loss of words, man. I can say they did it and I went along for the ride,” defensive coordinator Wes Gamble said. “Thanks for the ride, it was worth the ticket.”

“This is the best feeling in the world,” junior quarterback Hayden Barker said. “I haven’t felt anything like this. It’s much better than last week.”

The seniors

For the team’s 12 seniors, it was a fitting ending to their celebrated careers. Leaving Douglas High School as the only repeat champions in school history wasn’t enough, though. They played for another reason.

“It feels amazing. It’s indescribable,” senior running back Pierre Etchemendy said. “We got one for ourselves this year. As you know, it wasn’t just for a football championship. This was for Skye (Hiser) and Levi (Sober) and all those people. This feels great. I’m so happy.”

“It’s amazing. I don’t know what else to say,” senior lineman Tyler Crawford said. “It’s been a great season. We have a great coaching staff, great kids. We worked hard.”

“It feels amazing, incredible. I’m psyched, for sure,” senior fullback Colter McNare said. “As excited as I was, I think I was almost more sad because I knew that I’m done.”

The win

The Bearcats won by combining methodical drives with quick-flash big plays. Thanks to a breakout game from Barker, who threw for 242 yards and three touchdowns and added 47 yards and a touchdown on the ground, the Bearcats scored on three plays of 40 yards or more.

“We’ve had a lot of big plays throughout the year, but we’ve had a lot of great drives throughout the year,” Rhoades said. “We take what we can get. The kids performed great today. It didn’t matter if they needed a drive or a big play. It didn’t matter how it got done.”

“It was amazing watching (Hayden) play,” Falkenburg said. “I want to watch him next year. He has a lot to learn, but he’s on his way.”

Etchemendy rushed for 152 yards on 28 carries and scored two touchdowns to give him 2,036 rushing yards and 32 touchdowns on the season, both school records. Etchemendy is the only Wyoming athlete to rush for more than 2,000 yards since at least 2001, but statistics are not available before that.

“It’s an individual accomplishment with a team effort,” Etchemendy said. “It’s just another number. We know what it’s like in our hearts, what we play for, and that’s all that matters.”

That team effort starts with arguably the state’s best offensive line.

“We don’t get much credit, but we know where it’s at,” Crawford, an offensive lineman, said. “It’s great seeing Pierre get all the publicity that he has. It’s good because we know we did it for him. He’s a great athlete. We love blocking for him and he loves running for us.”

Douglas gained 266 yards on the ground and threw for 242 for a total of 508 yards of offense. Meanwhile, the defense held Cody to 217 yards of offense, and 73 of those came on a reverse play just before halftime with the Broncs already trailing 25-0.

“We just did what we did all year, we attacked,” Gamble said. “They caught us on one reverse and then one drive. That’s been kind of our deal all year. We play about nine or 10 of those three-and-out series. Our philosophy is if we can get them in seven or eight short series with three to four plays and maybe one first down we’re going to win the battle. There’s always one little letdown and that’s the improvement factor.”

The game

To start the game, Cody got the ball and went three-and-out, then Douglas embarked on one of the strangest and wackiest drives of the season. Behind a 12-yard Etchemendy run and a 15-yard Barker scramble, the Bearcats marched down to Cody’s 18-yard line with relative ease. Then things went awry.

On a fourth-and-11 play from the 18, Cody was called for pass interference on Justin Melton, giving Douglas first-and-goal on the nine. Two straight holding calls and a pass interference penalty on Melton left Douglas with a second-and-goal from the 41. After an Etchemendy run gained three yards, the Broncs were again called for pass interference and Douglas had a first-and-10 on the 23. Two plays later, Douglas was flagged for a false start, followed by Barker getting sacked and the Bearcats facing second-and-18. The Broncs were then called for a late hit, giving Douglas third-and-nine on the 10. Two plays later, Etchemendy mercifully ended the drive with a one-yard touchdown run up the gut. After failing on the two-point conversion, Douglas led 6-0 with 4:41 left in the first quarter.

“We knew we had it,” Etchemendy said. “Penalties were there, the refs were calling everything. We battled through that. They’re a good team and we’re a good team so we weren’t going to break every play for 20 yards. We ate away with five yards here and five yards there and then we broke a couple. That’s how you play football.”

Cody went three-and-out on its next possession, followed by a three-play, 50-yard Bearcat touchdown drive that ended abruptly on a 40-yard touchdown scamper by Barker. He was supposed to give the ball to Etchemendy on the play, but the two couldn’t make the hand-off and Barker took the broken play to pay dirt. Douglas led 12-0 with two minutes left in the first quarter.

“I didn’t get out there far enough to hand it off to Etchemendy so I figured I might as well hit the hole myself,” Barker said.

“He was supposed to hand it off to me and we didn’t mesh and I thought ‘Oh, crap’ and away he went,” Etchemendy said.

Cody went three-and-out to follow – at this point the Broncs had nine yards of total offense – and Douglas took only three plays to score again. After two penalties left Douglas with a second-and-22, Barker connected with Mitch Espeland on a 69-yard out pattern that Espeland took down the right sideline for a touchdown. Again, the two-point conversion was not successful, leaving Douglas with an 18-0 lead a minute into the second quarter.

“We have great receivers, our line gives great protection, it just makes everything so easy,” Barker said.

Cody proceeded to lose 10 yards on its next possession, but for once, Douglas didn’t respond, turning the ball over on downs. Cody managed to lose 10 more yards – it now had -11 net yards for the game – and punted back to Douglas with 3:54 left in the half. The Bearcats wasted no time, as Barker connected with Melton on a 54-yard touchdown pass on a go route down the right sideline. This time, Douglas called in placekicker Saxon Bull, who calmly made the extra point to give the Bearcats a 25-0 lead with 1:41 left before halftime.

“They didn’t shut Pierre down but they certainly contained him a little bit,” Rhoades said. “Things opened up and Hayden had a great game, Justin and Mitch came up big, (Danny) Palmer came up with a big catch at the end.”

The Broncs finally broke a play on their first run from scrimmage, as Brady Guide ran 73 yards on a reverse to set Cody up for a four-yard touchdown pass 44 seconds before the half. Still, the Broncs went into the locker rooms trailing 25-7.

After both teams traded three-and-outs to start the second half, Douglas put the game away for good with a 37-yard touchdown run from Etchemendy on a sweep around the left side. It was that play that put him over the 2,000 mark for the season, as he had 1,969 going into it. Bull connected on the extra point to put Douglas up 32-7 with 4:37 left in the third quarter.

Barker hit Espeland for a 33-yard pass early in Douglas’ next drive – following another Cody possession that ended with them losing yardage – to set up four-straight Dylan Klava runs. After gaining 38 yards on four plays, Klava found the end zone on a three-yard run off left tackle. Douglas held a commanding 38-7 lead with just 13 minutes of football remaining.

Cody managed its second scoring drive with an 11-play, 76-yard drive to pull within 24 at 38-14. The Bearcats took little time in responding, embarking on a 51-yard drive, capped by an 18-yard pass from Barker to Palmer to settle the final score at 44-14.

The undefeated

There were conflicting responses on whether the undefeated season added a layer of excellence to the championship.

“I think the kids expected that all year,” Gamble said. “Now, they look at it and say ‘It’s an undefeated season.’ But, as we preached week in and week out, it was one play at a time. They never worried about it. They played our style of football and they let the winning and losing take care of itself. Fortunately for us, it was all winning this year.”

The win gave Douglas back-to-back state championships for the first time in school history. It is the fourth state title in school history (1975, 1978, 2008, 2009). So how did this year’s title compare to last year’s, when Douglas beat Buffalo 34-21 at home for the school’s first football championship in 30 years?

“It’s really different,” Rhoades said. “That was a totally different team last year. For them to win, it was pretty tough. This year it was pretty dominating. We lost a lot of kids off that team last year so it’s a new championship for these kids.”

“Every group is a little different,” Gamble said. “Last year’s 22 seniors brought big plays and athletic ability and some individual efforts. This year’s team brought coachability, athletic ability and toughness. Next year will bring experience and reloading.”

The last game

For 12 seniors, it was their final game, including Jake Marcus, who was unable to play all season with a knee injury, but finally got on the field for the Bearcats’ final possession with a bulky knee brace on under his uniform.

As time was running out, Douglas took the field in a new formation, Victory 11, where all 11 seniors – with the exception of Keith Thompson who suffered a knee injury in the second quarter – took the field to kneel the ball and clinch the victory.

“This is a great group of kids and they finished it off the right way,” Rhoades said. “They did a phenomenal job of leading our team this year. I can’t say enough about those seniors.”

“(There’s) no doubt we have to replace irreplaceable kids,” Gamble said.

“It was great, it was fun,” Crawford said. “It’s been a long season and it’s been fun.”

“It’s an amazing feeling,” Falkenburg said. “No one touched us in the whole 3A division or the Nebraska team. It’s a freaking amazing feeling. I hope they keep it up next year to make it three times.”

But unlike last year, when the graduation of 22 seniors left many experts thinking Douglas would take a step backwards this year, the field was filled with juniors playing key roles this year. That plethora of experienced underclassmen had everyone thinking – even if they didn’t want to admit it – about a three-peat even as they celebrated Title No. 2.

“I’m not really thinking about next year right now, but it’s going to be great to have a lot of these kids back,” Rhoades said. “There’s going to be some kids who need to step in to fill some of the roles the seniors played this year. Hopefully, we keep the program going.”

 “They can do it,” McNare said. “I know they can.”