Published: October 11, 2008 12:01 am            

West Vigo rallies past Northview

One Houdini-like escape by Landon Keith provided West Vigo with the winning score in its Western Indiana Conference high school football win over visiting Northview on Friday.

Just for good measure, the Viking quarterback clinched the 14-13 thriller by defying disaster once more in the final minute.

“That was just Landon being Landon, being an athlete,” coach Jeff Cobb said after the game in recalling Keith’s 26-yard scramble for a touchdown on a fourth-and-16 play near the midpoint of the fourth quarter.

“That was how we drew [the play] up in practice,” Keith himself deadpanned in describing the play on which he rolled to his left, got out of the grasp of a Northview defensive lineman, broke another potential tackle heading back toward the line of scrimmage and suddenly found himself with running room, leaping and tumbling over the final two Knights into the end zone. “No, actually [the Knights] got a good rush on me, and I was lucky enough to break a couple of tackles.”

Keith’s touchdown — and the decisive extra point by freshman Nathan Gregg — were the last points of a second half that was a wide-open offensive show compared to the first two quarters. But the excitement was a long way from over.

Sophomore quarterback Trent Lancaster of the Knights, who had led a scoring drive for the visitors in the third quarter with some nifty running of his own, immediately brought his team back down the field again. Three quick first downs followed by Lancaster’s 9-yard run had Northview with the ball in a second-and-1 situation.

But then a penalty on what would have been a first-down conversion — “We shot ourselves in the foot with a lot of penalties,” coach George Gettle of the Knights said afterward, and he wasn’t just talking about that play — made it second-and-5; Lancaster was thrown for a loss by freshman Matt Flesher and Aaron Hoffman; Lancaster was sacked by Flesher and Jessie Earls; and John Burt picked off a fourth-down pass at the 12-yard line.

All West Vigo had to do was pick up one first down to run out the clock, and two runs netted nine yards. Then the snap to Keith was suddenly lying on the ground.

“[The ball] didn’t get up [to me] and it went right through my legs,” Keith said after the game, but he was able to pick up the ball, escape the grasp of a couple of Knights again, and dive for the first down.

The first half wasn’t quite so dramatic. A shotgun snap over Keith’s head recovered by either Kade Baker or Kyle Pestoff of the Knights set up a 3-yard touchdown run by Wes Sorlie four minutes into the game, and not one but two Lancaster touchdown passes were nullified by penalties on the Knights’ next possession — thus the Gettle quote — before both defenses took over.

“It was a strange game,” Cobb said later. “The first quarter started the way we wanted, but then that snap over the head took us right out of it. You can’t give a team as good as Northview field position like that.”

“I think we came out flat, no emotion,” Keith said. “The second half we came out fighting, the line was blocking well and we just executed our plays.”

The Vikings drove 66 yards in nine plays to a tying touchdown after the third-quarter kickoff, two completions to Aaron Welch and big runs by Kameron Silcock and Dylan Aff setting up Silcock’s 2-yard scoring run. But the Knights came right back, 66 yards themselves in seven plays with Lancaster getting the final 23 of them on a quarterback draw. The extra point was missed, however.

“When we gave Trent time, he threw some good passes, and he and all the backs ran hard,” Gettle said.

“You’re not going to stop Lancaster; he’s too good an athlete,” Cobb added. “The first half we did a pretty good job, but the second half was the Trent Lancaster show.”

After a Viking punt, big runs by Lancaster and Baker had Northview in scoring position again but the Vikings held them on downs. Then came the game-winning drive, 66 yards again in 10 plays plus five penalties — three by the Vikings — and two fourth-down conversions.

“My hat’s off to West Vigo; they played hard,” Gettle concluded. “Our effort was good. It was a good football game … a good conference game.”

“We’re feeling good,” said Keith, whose team clinched its first winning season in five years. “We just have to keep it going next week.”



West Vigo 14,

Northview 13

Northview 7 0 6 0 — 13

West Vigo 0 0 7 7 — 14

Nv — Wes Sorlie 3 run (Ken Wright kick), 8:00 1st

WV — Kameron Silcock 2 run (Nathan Gregg kick), 8:55 3rd

Nv — Trent Lancaster 23 run (kick failed), 5:15 3rd

WV — Landon Keith 26 run (Gregg kick), 7:42 4th

Nv WV

First downs 10 16

Rushes-yards 31-161 38-152

Passing yards 68 115

Comp-Att-Int 4-8-1 12-18-0

Return yards 0 1

Punts-avg 1-36 2-31

Fumbles-lost 0-0 4-1

Penalties-yards 6-69 6-47

Individual statistics

Rushing: Northview — Lancaster 19-100, Kade Baker 5-32, Sorlie 6-20, Corey Crowder 1-9. West Vigo — Silcock 13-71, Keith 17-60, Dylan Aff 3-32, Nick Cramer 3-11, John Burt 1-1, team 1-minus 23.

Passing: Northview — Lancaster 4-8-1-68. West Vigo — Keith 12-17-0-115, Aaron Welch 0-1-0-0.

Receiving: Northview — Zach Boetjer 3-50, Zac Niehaus 1-18. West Vigo — Welch 4-51, Cramer 3-5, Aff 2-37, Lucas Mackey 2-14, Silcock 1-8.

Next — West Vigo (6-2, 3-1 in Western Indiana Conference) plays Sullivan at home next Friday. Northview (3-5, 1-3) has a home game with Brown County that night.

        

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