Heartbreak At Martin Field

PULLMAN - WP Head Coach Jeff Bartlow had a sleepless night on Monday. After the semifinal loss against the Colfax Bulldogs, he kept running different plays, different strategies and different outcomes through his head, wondering what he could have, should have, would have done to win the game he feels the Cardinals had within their grasp. "It was easier last time, when we lost 39-0 (in the 2009 playoff game against the Bulldogs)," Bartlow said about coming to terms with that year's results. "They definitely had the better team then. But this year we had a team that could beat them." The Cardinals would have beaten the undefeated Bull­dogs if a football game had just one half. Not only did WP end the second quarter up 14-7, they dominated the field, shutting down the Bulldogs' running game and taking the Colfax coaching staff by surprise with their physical play.

"They executed to per­fection in the first half," Bulldogs' head coach Mike Morgan said about his team's unbeaten opponents. "They had us well scouted. They have a big, strong line that creates gaps for Zach (Bart­low) and Kris (Cady)." It took a little longer than usual, but the Cardinals scored first with 4:58 min­utes

to go in the first quarter putting them ahead 6-0 on their second possession. The seven-play, 53-yard drive saw Bartlow keep the ball for 17 yards to the Bulldogs' 11-yard line. He handed it off to Cady, who ran it in for a touchdown. Dalton Estes' kick went wide right. The next Colfax drive started promising until Bart­low picked off a pass from quarterback Alex Teade, and WP reversed the game's direction on the Bulldogs' 44-yard line. But Colfax's Tyler McNannay returned the favor when he picked off a Bartlow pass intended for TJ Hofer with 1:59 left in the quarter. After three fruitless plays (thanks to Cardinal David Brock's tackles), the Bull­dogs were forced to punt at the start of the second quarter and WP resumed possession on the Colfax 32-yard line. Bartlow threw a short pass to Cady, who drove it in from the 8-yard line for the Cardinals' second and last touchdown of the game.

Cady then threw a half­back pass to Estes for the two-point conversion, and WP had a 14-0 lead with more than 8 minutes to go in the first half.

"We had a tough time stopping Kris and Zach run­ning and scrambling," Mor­gan said. "We weren't play­ing well." The Cardinals again brought the Bulldogs' field campaign to a halt, thanks in part to a pass broken up by Dustin Wooderchak. But the Bulldogs finally created enough static to de­rail the ensuing Cardinals efforts that came within sev­eral feet of the end zone. The Bulldogs took over on downs but their runs went nowhere and when Teade finally took the fight to the air, Cady in­tercepted his pass to McNan­nay, and the Cardinals were back in business with 1:51 minutes in the half.

But between penalties and poor clock management, the Cardinals turned the ball over to the Bulldogs with enough time for them to launch a well-practiced two-minute offense, a drill Morgan de­scribed as "a religion for us." At that point, the WP crowd was so loud, "we couldn't hear the calls on the field," the Bulldogs coach said. But Teade "did a great job finding his receivers." It was the first sign Colfax had an advantage in the air and could make a dent in the Cardinals' defense. Teade , a senior, started the drive from the Colfax 37 and was on the WP 29-yard line with 27 seconds to go, then on the 15-yard line with 6 seconds to go, using plays and time outs to manage the clock. Finally, a pass to Justin Berarducci in the end zone got the Bulldogs their first touchdown. With the extra-point kick, the half ended 14-7. Both coaches said it was one of the game's pivotal points, starting the shift in momentum toward Colfax. "That got their swagger back," coach Bartlow said. "Before that, they had trouble with everything." To Colfax, it was critical to know "we were within striking distance going into the half," Morgan said. Dur­ing half time, the Bulldogs coach told his players it would take them every ounce of energy to come back, and he reminded them Auburn didn't give up even when that college team was behind 24-0 against Alabama this weekend.

"This is an awfully good ball club we're playing, I told the team," he said. "But we're going to come back. We needed to switch the turnover factor (which ran 3-0 against the Bulldogs)." And that's exactly what Colfax did in the second half. Though the Cardinals came out with plenty of swagger of their own, cau­tiously

optimistic that things would continue to go their way, the Bulldogs came out with a new strategy that took advantage of their speed on passing offense and confus­( ing quarterback Bartlow on defense. Colfax began switching unpredictably between man-to-man and zone coverage, leading Bartlow to mistake one for the other, forcing errors and grabbing intercep­tions. "They had a good scheme against Zach," his father said. "They changed things more than we did."

The third quarter was largely a defensive battle un­til Teade put together a 9-play 80-yard drive that ended in a 24-yard touchdown pass to Kellen Morgan, which narrowed WP's lead to 1 at 14-13. The extra-point kick went wide right.

The WP drive that fol­lowed turn out to be the heartbreaker of the semifinal,first lifting the players' spir­its, and then rudely deflating them. After a 31-yard kick-off return by Cady, Bartlow broke free on a keeper and ran the ball 59 yards into the end zone. But there was a flag on the play, yet another "illegal shift" call from the officials who penalized both teams for the vaguely named sanction at the drop of a hat. In this case, Wooderchak had jumped off sides, and the touchdown came back.

"That call was very disap­pointing," defensive lineman Tre Brannock said.

A touchdown at that point would have given WP an 8-point lead with the extra point and 9 points with a conversion. Instead the quar­ter

ended with an offensive pass interference call against Hofer, who was the target of a Bartlow pass that was in­tercepted by Brandon Heiser, rendering the period score­less for the Cardinals, still only up by one point.

The teams traded posses­sions, and on the next WP drive, Bartlow was inter­cepted

again. WP's defense came through, keeping the team's hopes alive when the Cardinals first deflected a third-down pass (Eshom Estes) in the red zone, then blocked a Colfax field goal attempt with Cady coming up with the ball.

But the next WP drive stalled after three downs, and Colfax took over on the WP 45, determined to top the Cardinals' score. The Bull­dogs were quickly just inside the red zone. Teade threw a 19-yard pass to Damon Buck for the third Colfax touch­WP down, then, after a holding call that reversed a first con­version attempt, he threw a 16-yard pass to Berarducci for the two-point conversion, putting the Bulldogs ahead 21-14 with 3:45 minutes re­maining in the game. Another interception kept WP from tying the game. Kellen Morgan picked off a Bartlow pass intended for Cady on a fourth down play from the Cardinals' own 28-yard line as the clock ate away what remained of WP's hopes and dreams.

"We made too many mis­takes," coach Bartlow said, referring to unforced errors and penalties. Those penalties scared senior running back Justin Armstrong because it re­minded him of the way the team struggled with a barrage of yellow flags at the begin­ning of the season.

"It was killing our mo­mentum," he said. "Still, it was a great season. We gave Colfax a game."

WP vs Colfax

WP 6 8 0 0 14

Colfax 0 7 6 8 21

Rushing - Zach Bartlow: 19 for 84; and Kris Cady: 11 for 39.

Passing - Bartlow: 9/24 for 100 yards.

Receiving - Dalton Estes: 2 for 10; Kris Cady 6 for 48; and TJ Hofer: 1 for 42.