Team Wins After Trailing 16-2 In 4th Quarter
(Editor’s note to commemorate the WWHS wolverine championship season the High Desert advocate will reprint the original stories of the playoffs published 10 years ago for the next three weeks.)
In less than four minutes Saturday the West Wendover Wolverines made up a 16-2 deficit, broke all team records and proved that sometimes miracles do happen.
Facing a tough Battle Mountain team Saturday afternoon in the first round of the AA playoffs the Wolverines stood on the threshold of going where no other West Wendover team had gone before.
But after the first 44 minutes of a 48-minute game it appeared the winningest football team in history would stay on the threshold and have to wait till next year.
Leading 9-2 with a little over four minutes left Battle Mountain delivered what should have been the death blow to West Wendover with seventy yard march down the field capped off with a four yard touchdown run from Battle Mountain’s Scott Bullock.
Wolverine fans hung their heads in the stands and prepared to leave while Longhorn backers on the other side of the field whooped, wailed and began to make plans for a trip to Las Vegas.
To win this game West Wendover didn’t one miracle but a pocket full.
Somehow they got them.
On the kick off Wolverine senior Tony Gonzales returned the ball to the Battle Mountain 44 on the first play from scrimmage 1,000-yard rusher Pedro Morquecho took off for an 18-yard scamper.
Then the bend but don’t break Battle Mountain defense stood firm. On the very next play West Wendover was thrown for a 1-yard loss, the next play was an incomplete pass. The one after that resulted in a five-yard penalty to the Wolverines leaving them on third and 17 and less than four minutes to play.
Miracles happen.
Quarterback Mitch Dean who hadn’t connected with a receiver the entire game lofted the ball to the end zone right into the arms of Longhorn defender Brian Lenz. Playing it safe Lenz batted down the ball into the outstretched hands of Wolverine Kade Brown.
The score was 16-8 and stayed that way with a failed two-point try.
A failed on-side kick put the ball on the West Wendover 49 and in the hands of the Longhorns.
The task before the Wolverines was to somehow get the ball back score a touch down then a two point conversion from a team that had outplayed them for the previous 45 minutes. And to do all of that in 2 minutes and 44 seconds.
Miracles happen.
On the very first play Longhorn quarterback Jacob Vierra fumbled and West Wendover recovered. As the Wolverines recovered the ball Dean recovered his arm. On three consecutive plays the West Wendover senior connected with Hollibaugh for 8 yards, then to Brian Vanderbeusse for 24 and then to Gonzales for 14.
The ball was just five yards shy of the Longhorn end zone and the clock showed 1:45 to go. And again the Longhorns appeared to hold. Twice Wendover tried to run it in and twice they were denied.
The third time was the charm. Morquecho took the hand off from Dean and powered his way in for the score, which after that was 16-14 and the clock now showed 1:15.
For the two-point conversion West Wendover coach Brian Poole turned to Gonzales. The senior halfback took the snap and ran right into Longhorn David Rubacalva. For that brief moment what was a team sport became an individual battle between two young men both wanting desperately to win.
Gonzales wanted it more and with the strength bred by perhaps three previous seasons of futility the West Wendover senior extended his arms into the end zone and scored.
This time it was the West Wendover fans turn to cheer while Battle Mountain’s sat in stunned silence.
With a little less than a minute remaining the Longhorns played it safe, running the ball four times fumbling and recovering twice.
The game went into overtime and Battle Mountain won—the coin flip.
According to NIAA rules each team has four possessions on the opponent’s ten yard line to score as many times as possible.
Battle Mountain elected to defend first, the advantage being that even if West Wendover did score, the Longhorns would have four chances to out distance their upstart rivals.
The Longhorns once again held for the first three possessions leaving West Wendover just one last play to break the tie.
Miracles happen.
And again it was Tony Gonzales who made it happen. Taking the snap from center Gonzales lobbed one of the ugliest yet most beautiful passes in team history into the hands of Kade Brown and into the end zone. Brown tacked on the extra point and the score was 23-16 with the Longhorns four possessions still coming.
On the first play Vierra threw an incompletion, on second down Longhorn halfback Tim Andersen was tackled behind the line of scrimmage by Wolverine senior Chris Marriott for a three-yard loss. A screen pass on third down also came up short. That brought up fourth down and Battle Mountain’s last chance to redeem a game they thought they had won.
Vierra previously accurate for much of the game lofted a pass to the end zone where Wolverine Jared Hollibaugh didn’t play it safe. He didn’t bat it down. He caught it.
Sometimes miracles happen.
Sometimes miracles are made.
West Wendover plays Faith Lutheran Saturday in Las Vegas at 1 pm PDT.