State semifinal recap: 4 Wichita area teams clinch their spots in championship games
Seven teams entered. Four are moving on.
The Wichita area will have four representatives at this year’s 2019 Kansas high school football state championship games across all classifications. Here is how they got there:
Cheney at Andale: Seniors go undefeated at home
Less than a month ago, Andale and Cheney were tied at 14 at halftime in the regular season finale.
At halftime Friday night, Andale was one score away from a running clock against the same team. The Indians beat Cheney 55-20 in their 2019 Kansas Class 3A state semifinal to reach their second title game in three years and third since they last won it in 2014.
“We were just so fired up,” senior quarterback Easton Hunter said. “We come out and punch them straight in the mouth and keep on going.”
Hunter scored the game’s opening touchdown. After a quick stop on defense, Hunter took the snap and found a crease in the defense. He went for a 54-yard score.
He said when he hit the open field, he knew his team had it Friday night.
Andale doesn’t typically get two shots at the same team. The last time it happened was 2011 against Rose Hill when the Indians lost both games and finished 5-6. It was believed to be the most losses in school history.
So after a close call against Cheney in Week 8 when Andale poked out a 29-22 home win, the captains called for a team meeting.
“We told everyone, ‘We need to get this going if we want to win state,’ ” senior cornerback Scotti Easter said. “We cranked it up big time as you can see.”
Accountability and flexibility are two pillars of the Andale football program. Friday night, Andale’s leading rusher, junior Eli Rowland, was out with a groin injury.
Hunter, senior Mac Brand and junior Noah Meyer stepped up in his place and accounted for every first half touchdown.
By the time the teams came back onto the field after halftime, Andale was already penciled into the state championship game Nov. 30 in Hutchinson. And before the third quarter ended, the game announcer called attention to the starting defense for its efforts as the junior varsity team took the field.
Brand said the program isn’t beholden to one player.
“That’s just one man,” Brand said. “You take down one, we’ve got 60 more to fill in.”
Although Andale didn’t lose a lot of senior production from last year’s state semifinal team, it lost arguably its most iconic player in school history, Mason Fairchild, who earned Top 11 honors as a defensive end and tight end. He now plays for Kansas.
The Indians also lost three All-AVCTL IV first team starting offensive linemen. It hasn’t mattered.
Cheney scored one touchdown on Andale’s starters Friday as Cardinal senior Riley Petz took a reverse on a kickoff 75 yards to the end zone. The Andale defense didn’t give up any points.
“We’ve got guys that, man, they look hungry when they’re out there,” coach Dylan Schmidt said. “It just seems like at every spot, we have somebody there that’s ready to go.”
Cheney entered the sub-state round for the first time in school history after beating Scott City 38-7 on the road. Now Andale will face another Cinderella.
Perry-Lecompton (9-3) will await the Indians in Hutchinson after beating Topeka Hayden 35-27 on the road. It will be the school’s second state championship game appearance in school history and the first since 2008.
The Kaws have never won a state title. They didn’t even win their district this season, but they have won six straight, including two over Hayden.
Their opponents entered their playoff meeting with Perry-Lecompton with a 33-5 record.
Andale’s football title game appearance comes on the heels of the school’s volleyball team achieving the same feat Nov. 2, less than a month earlier, in the same city.
It also comes two years since Andale last reached the playoffs’ final weekend. In 2017, the Indians went to the title game in Class 4A-Division I. They lost 47-7 to Bishop Miege.
Schmidt said the energy has been extraordinarily high.
Easter said this year will be different because the seniors have played together since they were in elementary school and a state title has always been the dream.
Brand joked and said it might come down to one simple thing:
“We don’t play Miege,” Brand said.
Schmidt has been around Andale football almost his entire life. He has seen state championship teams. He has coached a state runner-up and a team that fell in the semifinal round.
Schmidt said he hopes this is one of the special ones.
“We’re going to find out,” Schmidt said. “We’re going to give it everything we’ve got. I know our guys are pumped and ready to go.”
Andover Central at McPherson: Only 7 points
Taylor Eldridge, teldridge@wichitaeagle.com
At midnight before the biggest football game of his life, Andover Central senior defensive back Jake Taylor was still awake watching film of McPherson’s offense and drawing their routes in a notebook.
Taylor estimated he watched 12 hours of film this week before a Class 4A semifinal clash on Friday in McPherson. A tendency he noticed was McPherson liked to run crossing routes as a decoy with the objective to throw back to the far side for a big play.
It was the only way Taylor knew where to be to make the game-saving play in the end zone to close out Andover Central’s 7-0 victory over McPherson to send the Jaguars (11-1) to their second state championship game appearance, where they will face Bishop Miege (10-2) in Topeka next Saturday.
“I’m just very passionate about playing football,” Taylor said. “I’ve been restricted with injuries, but I push through. This means everything to me. My dad is my coach and he coaches me up and he’s one of my biggest role models in my life.”
McPherson’s final attempt of tying the game came on a 4th and goal from the 7-yard line with under two minutes remaining. The Bullpups lined up three receivers to the right with Taylor matched up on the lone receiver on the left side.
McPherson quarterback Kaleb Hoppes took the snap and rolled to his right, an attempt to suck Andover Central’s defense to that side of the field and open up a throw-back for an easy touchdown.
Sure enough, the McPherson receiver broke free and was open when Hoppes made the decision to throw. But instead of following his receiver to the decoy side, Taylor swiveled his hips before the ball was even released to sniff out the play and bat the ball down in the end zone for the game-sealing play.
“(Taylor) is the biggest film-watcher on our team,” Andover Central senior linebacker Trey DeGarmo said. “He wrote down every single one of their plays and he will never tell anybody that, but he spends so many hours on that. He knew exactly what was coming and that’s why he made the play. He’s just a dog and he’s going to make every play like that.”
It was a devastating ending for McPherson, even more so because it was so familiar. It was the third straight season the Bullpups have lost in the state semifinals — all by a touchdown or less. McPherson has still never been to a state championship game in school history.
The latest chapter of bitter losses will be remember for McPherson’s three trips inside Andover Central’s 20-yard line with no points with the last being the most excruciating when the Bullpups could not capitalize on a 1st-and-goal from the 3-yard line in the waning moments of the game.
Still, McPherson coach Jace Pavlovich said he thought the team’s final play call was the perfect one — it was just a perfect defensive play by Taylor.
“We got the look that we wanted, but (Taylor) came off of his coverage and made a heck of a play on the ball,” Pavlovich said. “We had our opportunities. We had our chances.
“If you would have told me that defensively we put up the effort we did tonight to contain their big-play threats, then I would have told you we had a really good shot to win the game.”
Instead, Pavlovich and McPherson will try to wrap their minds around how they lost when their defense pitched a shut out and held Andover Central’s high-octane offense to 1.9 yards per play, 83 total yards and four first downs.
Special teams proved to be the difference in the game, as Andover Central went all-out for a punt block early in the second quarter and senior Tate Forcella ended up stripping McPherson’s punter and junior Kyren Parrott scooped up the loose ball and returned it 20 yards for a touchdown.
“I wanted to get the ball and get to the end zone,” Parrott said. “I was glad I was able to do that. It feels amazing to be able to let the seniors keep playing and keep making history.”
With its offense unable to sustain drives, Andover Central had to lean on its defense to absorb 76 plays — nearly doubled what the Jaguars ran. Even with McPherson throwing 39 times, Andover Central’s secondary allowed just 108 yards passing and 14 completions.
When the game ended and the teams had shaken hands, the Jaguars sprinted to their student section and hopped the fence to celebrate.
“I couldn’t control myself, we were so hyped up,” DeGarmo said. “We knew we could do this from the start, but now it’s here, it’s just so surreal.”
“I’m a pretty stoic guy, but this is a lot of fun,” Central first-year coach Derek Tuttle said. “I’ll probably even get a smile or two in later.”
| Andover Central (11-1) | 0 | 7 | 0 | 0 | — | 7 |
| McPherson (11-1) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 |
AC—Parrott 20 fumble return (White kick)
Rushing—Andover Central, Parnell 11-32, Herrmann 7-9, Rees 5-3, Team 4-(-4); McPherson, Feil 21-96, Hoppes 10-28, Ramey 3-5, Powell 2-(-1), Team 1-(-15).
Passing—Andover Central, Parnell 7-17-1-43; McPherson, Hoppes 14-39-1-108.
Receiving—Andover Central, X. Bell 5-33, Kohman 1-9, J. Bell 1-1; McPherson, Powell 11-82, Feil 1-13, Buckbee 1-8, Clarke 1-5.
Maize at Wichita Northwest: Scoring at a historic rate
Aliyah Funschelle, Eagle correspondent
The Wichita Northwest Grizzlies move on to their second consecutive Kansas Class 5A state championship game after defeating the Maize Eagles 80-42 on Friday night at Northwest.
The Grizzlies put up more points on the Eagles than all of Maize’s opponents combined.
The game was the fourth highest scoring game in Kansas high school football playoff history. Northwest also holds the second and third highest scoring spots — with the 84-67 win against Carroll last season and their 67-60 victory over Maize in 2018 as the third highest.
Although the two teams put up a significant amount of points against each other on Friday, Maize and Northwest both have notable defenses. The teams have only given up a combined 131 points the entire season, with eight combined shutouts.
Northwest knew that they would have to try to capitalize on any offensive opportunity possible to win against Maize.
“We just knew coming into this game that we had to score every time we touched the ball,” senior quarterback Reagan Jones said. “I think we didn’t score like once or twice, so that was really good.”
Despite what the final score might suggest, the first half was highly contested. But Northwest was able to put up two late touchdowns to go into the half with a 17-point lead.
The high-scoring nature of the game continued into the second half, although Northwest’s defense was able to pull together to slow down Maize.
By holding Maize to 42 points, Northwest would have still been able to win the game even if they were scoreless the entire second half.
“We saw some things that we thought that we could exploit,” Northwest coach Steve Martin said. “We wanted to play physical football.”
Martin said his team had great practices this week.
“We really challenged them this week,” Martin said. “We went out here when we could’ve easily went and practiced in the gym this week, but we came out in the rain and we had one of the best practices that we’ve had since I’ve been here in eight years. Our kids were just dialed in, and it was fun for them to come out and execute tonight.”
Practicing in non-ideal weather is just one thing that is a testament to the Grizzlies’ team work ethic. The tight-knit team relationship and willingness to buy in is what helped Northwest be successful in the postseason.
Every day, the team practices during “zero hour” at 6:30 in the morning. Putting in the extra work is something that both the players and the parents value about the program.
“We work hard. We work around the clock. We get up at 6:30 — no kids want to do that. Our kids do it every morning,” Martin said. “We do things the right way around here, and we work hard, and we work for it.”
Although Northwest’s defense let up more points than they would have liked, Martin remains positive for the state championship.
“That’s an explosive offense. Are we broken? No,” Martin said. “All you have to do is win by one point next week and that’s all we care about here.”
The Grizzlies will play Mill Valley for the 5A state championship next Saturday in Pittsburg.
Topeka at Derby: 6 trips in 7 years
It has only been done three other times in Kansas high school football history.
Derby reached its sixth Class 6A state championship game in seven years Friday with a 63-35 home win over Topeka. That dominance has been seen at the highest classification in Kansas enough times to fit on one hand.
- Wichita Southeast (1972-1980): 9 seasons, 8 appearances, 4 championships
- Lawrence (1984-1995): 12 seasons, 11 appearances, 9 championships
- Olathe North (1996-2003): 8 seasons, 7 appearances, 7 championships
- Derby (2013-present): 7 seasons, 6 appearances, 4 championships
Derby hasn’t missed back-to-back state championship games since Wichita Heights made it in 2011.
The Panthers mauled Topeka in the first half taking a 49-14 lead. Derby was outscored in the second half 21-14, but it wasn’t enough.
Derby will face Olathe North (10-2), the last time to have the kind of dominance of Class 6A the Panthers have shown, in the state championship game Nov. 30 at Emporia State University.
Olathe North beat Blue Valley 28-7 in its state semifinal.
The Panthers are looking to become the first team to finish back-to-back undefeated 6A title-winning seasons since Hutchinson did it in 2006-07.
This story was originally published November 23, 2019 at 1:17 AM.