Panthers Beat #3 Union Grove in Finale
Only As Good As Your Last Performance
It was their championship.
Wilmot got one more game.
In a year when COVID-19 took many football games away, including playoffs, the Panthers got an opportunity to finish their season vs. the undefeated, and #3 ranked team in the state, Union Grove Broncos, for their season finale.
Defensive end, Braidy Beagle (#23), was clutch late in the game. The senior blocked a game-tying extra point with 2:18 remaining, then pressured Bronco QB Nash Wolf into a sack and a fumble with only 49 seconds remaining, to seal a 21-20 victory.
Defensive coordinator, Brian Hopkins, raved about Beagle after the game, “You can’t replace a kid like Braidy Beagle. His effort, his energy, and his leadership, in the classroom, in the community, and on the field, he’s a once-in-a-lifetime player.”
Senior quarterback, Mike Bojesen (#7), ran for a touchdown, passed for 2 more touchdowns, then bulldozed into the south end zone for the game-winning two-point conversion. He finished the game with 198 passing yards. The 6’4″ Korik Klein was his favorite target with 6 receptions for 173 yards, and 2 touchdowns. Senior running back Leo Falletti (#8) was the Panthers leading rusher with 66 yards.
The Panthers trailed 14-7 at halftime. Klein’s first TD cut the Bronco lead to 14-13 after a missed extra-point.
Then the Panthers took the lead with 6:33 remaining in the 3rd quarter. Klein outjumped and outfought two Bronco defensive backs in the end zone, and came down with his second touchdown to make the score 19-13. Bojesen would then plow in behind his offensive line for a two-point conversion, and a 21-14 lead.
The Panthers offensive line consists of: Joe Devall (#57), Beau Schwertfeger (#70), Ethan Ivan (#62), Josh Amenson (#66), James Tsakonas (#77), and Ryan Worklan (#68).
Union Grove would score a touchdown with 2:18 remaining in the 4th quarter, and looked to tie it up on the PAT kick, but Beagle launched through a hole in the line, and blocked the low kick, leaving Wilmot with a 21-20 lead.
The Wilmot offense would get the ball back, but once again, could not grind out the clock. They had 1st-and-10 with 2:18 remaining in the game. However, Union Grove would stuff the run, burn their timeouts, and get the ball back with 1:55 remaining.
Suddenly, the Wilmot defense had to live by it’s own motto, “Bend, but don’t break.”
After three great defensive plays, the Panthers had yet another chance to put Union Grove away with a 4th-and-7 and 1:11 remaining. But the Broncos completed a 26-yard pass down the right sideline, and had new life with a 1st-and-10 at Wilmot’s 34 yard line with 1:00 remaining.
Not realizing that his receiver had gotten out of bounds, Wolf ‘clocked’ the ball on first down, creating a 2nd-and-10. That’s when Beagle, Aaron Denko (#22), Hunter Ornberg (#46), Mason Langford (#6) and Mateo Quiroz (#45) came through on a jail break. The pressure was immediate and in all directions. It appeared that Quiroz ripped the ball out, but no-doubt that it was Langford who recovered it.
Then Bojesen came in to run the victory formation for the final 2 snaps. The game was over. The season was over. The seniors were done.
Coach Square was quick to point out how badly these kids wanted to play football, no matter the circumstances. “It [shows] the determination of this group. The whole time, anytime anything happened, a quarantine here-or-there, they continued to say they wanted to play. We haven’t played a game since, I think what, October 23rd? It’s been almost a month since we’ve played a game, and they kept on coming to practice. The guys that weren’t quarantined would come out here and get some work in. Just the determination of this whole group, in general, to want to be able to continue to play, it’s just unbelievable.”
Square continued with how his defense never panicked, even when momentum seemed to shift. “It just shows the character of this team. And that’s kind of how we’ve been the whole time. It’s been an uphill battle, and we’ve had adversities that we’ve had to overcome, at every turn, and our guys just do it…. We’ve talked about adversity, all year, because that’s just kind of what we’ve had. They had the 4th-and-8, and they got a big play out of it, and our defense didn’t just hang their head. They came out, got after them, got the sack, got the fumble and put the game away,” he said.
Coach Hopkins added, “I think it speak testament to our program. To the grit, perseverance, and effort of our kids. They’ve worked their tails off. They’ve been through a lot of adversity this year, and they just kept overcoming, and overcoming, and overcoming, and overcoming. I’ll tell you what, the effort from our defense, this last week we were coming back for a football game, and we had 2 or 3 starters kind of go down the night before, because of quarantine, so we are playing with two sophomores, who haven’t seen a varsity snap all year, so the energy and effort these kids had was unbelievable, and I couldn’t be more proud as their defensive coordinator. We always say, ‘You can’t stop a train’, and we like to think we are that train. We did the best we could, and the effort was amazing.”
