LARNED — It was an old-fashioned, bone-jarring slugfest of a football game at Earl Roberts Stadium Friday evening as the Larned High School Indians handed Hoisington’s new head coach, Zach Baird, a loss in his coaching debut, 21-20 in two overtimes.
It was the toe of a 125-pound freshman, David Valadez, that finally ended this well played contest as he kicked the conversion attempt through the uprights ending a 20-20 tie between the Cardinals and Indians.
Indian fans and players stormed the field surrounding Valadez.
By far, Valadez was not the only hero on the field.
Both teams received great effort from their players.
For the first game of the season, it was extremely well played. Larned only had three penalties and Hoisington two.
Both teams were in mid-season form. The hitting was terrific, but the sportsmanship for both teams was stellar. It was a game to make both coaches and all fans proud.
In a battle of the wills, the two teams fought to a 0-0 halftime.
The Cardinals completed a 35-yard pass play that got to the 1-yard line as the clock ran out at halftime as Hoisington had no timeouts.
Yardage was hard to come by as the defense of both teams gave a little but just wouldn’t break.
The second half started out with the defenses still dominating, but a fumble by Hoisington’s Hunter Hanzlick was recovered by the Indians and they put together a march.
The Indians’ Landon Erway bolted 30 yards to the Hoisington 3-yard line, and after a busted play and a penalty, the Indians were facing a fourth down from the 11-yard line.
Quarterback Trey Kraisinger found Tyler Stelter for a touchdown pass and the Indians drew first blood. Following a roughing the kicker penalty the Indians’ Evan Skelton scored on a 2-point conversion and Larned had the 8-0 lead.
Hoisington put together a strong drive which was capped by a 2-yard touchdown run by KC Stephens and following a run for the conversion the Cardinals had tied it at 9:09 of the third quarter.
In the fourth quarter Larned put together a short drive that moved the ball down inside the 20-yard line, but a 10-yard sack of Kraisinger left Larned out of field goal range and the Indians had a last-gasp attempt at a pass from the 28-yard line to win the game that fell incomplete.
In the first overtime, Larned had the ball first and on a fourth down from the 7-yard line Trey Kraisinger found Isiah Perez with a touchdown pass.
The conversion kick by Valadez failed.
Hoisington quickly tied the game as Hanzlick raced in from the seven for the tying points.
Convert the extra point and the Cardinals could win the game, but Zade Sanders was stopped just inches from the goal line and the game moved to the second overtime.
In the second overtime, Grant Dolechek rambled in from the 8-yard line, but a failed attempted run for the two-point conversion by Sanders left the Cardinals leading 20-14.
Things looked bad for the Indians as on their first play they fumbled the ball and recovered but were left with a second down and now 17 yards from paydirt.
However, on the very next play Kraisinger found tight end Stelter for a 17-yard touchdown to knot the game 20-20. Then the Valadez calmly booted the extra point as the Indians celebrated.
Hoisington had the better of the statistical battle as they rushed the ball 60 times for 255 yards and completed one pass for 35 yards.
Larned netted 116 yards rushing on 36 attempts and piled up 58 yards passing on seven out of 15 completions.
It was a key battle for two of the leading ball clubs in the Central Kansas League West Division. Next week Hoisington will host Nickerson and Larned will travel to LaCrosse to take on the No. 1-ranked Class 2A Leopards.