Marmion advances to state championship
DANVILLE -- At one point in a wild third quarter when Danville took its turn trading big plays with Marmion in the Class 6A state semifinals Saturday, a Cadet coach intensely instructed his players, “Don't get your heads down! That's the kind of game this is!”
What kind of game was it? One that sent Marmion to state for the first time in school history.
One filled with, as Cadets coach Dan Thorpe put it, “big-time people making big-time plays.” The Cadets got the first one a 64-yard touchdown run by T.J. Lally on the third play of the game and the last one Kyle Kozak's interception with 50 seconds left to leave town with a 31-28 nail-biter.
Marmion (12-1) will play for the Class 6A state championship next Saturday at Memorial Stadium in Champaign against Rockford Boylan, a 14-7 winner over Prairie Ridge.
The Cadets got there by handing Danville (12-1) its first loss a week after doing the same to Lemont.
“We've got guts, we've got athletes, we've got an excellent staff,” Thorpe said. “It's a program victory. It's a reflection of the school and our football team.”
Marmion never trailed in the game and three times built 2-touchdown leads. But with the quick strikes the Vikings kept throwing at them, the lead never felt safe until Kozak's last-minute interception at the Cadets' 32-yard line.
“You get kind of nervous when it gets close at the end, but it's great,” said Marmion offensive lineman Graham Glasgow, who hobbled off the field early in the fourth quarter but limped back in a few minutes later. “Everybody is working together well and everybody is trusting the guy next to him. Everyone is doing their job.”
The Cadets' first 14-point lead came when Nick Scoliere followed Lally's opening TD with a swift cutback in the open field to score on a 17-yard run with 8:08 left in the second quarter.
After a slow start, an explosive Vikings offense that entered the game averaging 44.3 points a game finally started clicking. Quarterback Dennis Hightower found Joey Robinson for a 25-yard touchdown to trim Marmion's lead to 14-7 at halftime.
Marmion junior Mike Eberth recovered a fumble to start the third quarter and Lally followed with his second touchdown run, this one 21 yards through a gaping hole in the right side of the line opened by Jake Winkel and Tyler Heinen.
That 21-7 lead lasted all of 14 seconds until Danville's Edward Clark ran the ensuing kick back 95 yards. Marmion again grabbed a 28-14 lead when Mike Carbonara extended to haul in quarterback Bobby Peters' pass for a 32-yard touchdown, yet Clark again had the answer for the Vikings with a 32-yard touchdown run to bring Danville within 28-21 going to the fourth quarter.
“We kept feeling like we were going to pull away but you have to give it up to Danville,” Lally said. “They wouldn't quit. We all lost hair doing this game. So nerve-racking.”
Kicker A.J. Friedman helped settle Lally's nerves not to mention Marmion's half of a crowd that the local Danville radio station estimated between 4,000 and 5,000 with a 37-yard field goal and a 31-21 lead.
It didn't take long for those nerves to return. Clark broke free on a 56-yard run on a fourth-and-3 call to bring the Vikings within 31-28 with 6:28 remaining.
Hoping to run out the clock, Marmion's offense picked up one first down. Quarterback Bobby Peters hit Phil Kloc on a 9-yard game, leaving the Cadets with fourth-and-1 at midfield, three minutes remaining and a decision for Thorpe.
Thorpe resisted the cries from the crowd, not to mention a few players, to go for it. Friedman delivered a 45-yard punt to pin Danville at its own 5-yard line with 2:49 remaining.
“We are going to punt the ball and play defense,” Thorpe said. “It is hard for high school kids to go 90-some yards.”
The Vikings just about did. A 45-yard pass put Danville at Marmion's 37-yard line. D'Landro Carter's spectacular one-handed catch in double coverage would have moved the Vikings to the Cadets' 5-yard-line poised for the winning score until a holding penalty set up by Lally's blitz negated the play.
“I didn't see it, I wasn't looking for it. It's a tough call,” said Danville and former Waubonsie Valley coach B.J. Luke. “We have to come back and make another play but it gets hard at second-and-20.”
That call proved to be the backbreaker. Scoliere followed with a sack and then Kozak came away with his interception, the fourth turnover by the Marmion defense that also included fumble recoveries for Eberth, Mitch Loehmann and Kozak.
“We have fourth-and-inches, we had confidence in our defense and they came through,” Peters said. “They came through when it mattered.”
As the defense mobbed Kozak and the offense went out to take a knee, Marmion's student section started chanting “O-ver-ra-ted” until Thorpe quickly came over and got a new chant started of “On to state!”
“This is unreal, it still hasn't sunk in,” said Scoliere who after his sack shifted to corner back for the only time in the game to help defend against any last-second long pass. “I'm still going over in my head things I could have done better and everyone could have done better, but we won.”
They did it despite Clark's 181 yards rushing and 2 touchdowns. He also had the 95-yard kick return and appeared to be going for another score in the third quarter when the ball popped loose and Kozak recovered in the end zone for a touchback.
“They are a good team,” Clark said. “They came out and played hard from the start. We came out and weren't ready at the beginning of the game. We weren't mentally ready.”
“The first play kind of put us on our heels a little bit,” Luke said of Lally's touchdown run that came after he followed a hole on the left side created by Graham and Ryan Glasgow, broke one tackle and outran the Vikings down the left sideline. “We are not used to that. They have been ahead the whole year.”
Lally finished with 164 of the Cadets' 232 rushing yards. Peters completed 5 of 9 passes for 72 yards. While Danville outgained Marmion 353-304, the Cadets again won the turnover battle 4:1.
“It's a dream come true, just watching it (state) on TV the last few years,” Peters said. “It's a dream come true. It's where every kid wants to be. That's it. There's nothing greater than that.”