By Greg Perkins It took a big defensive stand on a gutsy call by a former east region coach, and a missed field goal by American Leadership Academy (ALA), but the Snowflake Lobos have advanced to the 3A State Championship thanks to surviving a 28-27 final outcome against ALA Gilbert North on Saturday afternoon in the semi final round. The second ranked Lobos met up with the third ranked Eagles at Coronado High School and the game was a tale of two halves. Snowflake had complete control on the first half building a 21-0 lead and seemingly cruising their way to the title game. The second half things changed. It was ALA Gilbert who piled up 21 unanswered points sending the game to overtime, after a late field goal was missed by the Eagles kicker with eight seconds left in regulation. In the overtime, Snowflake got the ball first and scored in two plays when Camden Brimhall found the endzone on a one-yard plunge. Sam Crockett’s point after kick gave Snowflake the 28-21 overtime lead. American Leadership was up next and they also scored, theirs coming on a four-yard run. Making the score 28-27. This is where things really got interesting. Former Show Low coach Randy Ricedorff who is now the head coach at ALA Gilbert decided to put all the marbles into one play. Instead of kicking the point after and forcing a second overtime, he chose to keep his offense on the field and either win the game or lose the game on one two-point conversion play. That play was a pretty basic power run off right tackle, which Snowflake’s defense sniffed out and stopped at about the one-yard line ending the game with the Lobos on top 28-27. Snowflake’s offense scored on their first three possessions. Terren Green capped a 12-play drive with a one-yard plunge making the score 7-0 midway through the first. The second Lobo drive culminated in a five-yard rushing score by Brimhall, pushing the lead to 14-0. That scoring drive lasted 11 plays. The Lobos third scoring drive of the half came in seven plays. Green scored on a three-yard run with six minutes left in the half extending the lead to 21-0 with Crockett’s kick. Snowflake had a big defensive stand at the end of the first half, which kept the momentum in their favor going into the break. American Leadership started to figure out the Lobo defense midway through the third, getting their first points on a short pass completion making the score 21-7. A quick Snowflake interception led to another Eagles score which came midway through the final period cutting the Lobo lead to 21-14. Snowflake was forced to punt and ALA quickly moved the ball inside the Lobo five-yard line. From there, a one-yard scoring run tied the score at 21-21, with under four minutes remaining. Snowflake had to punt the ball away late in the game and ALA moved the ball into field goal position. That field goal was missed in the final seconds leaving the score knotted at 21-21. Snowflake will now face top seeded and unbeaten, Northwest Christian in the 3A State Championship game on Saturday. The game will also be played at Coronado High School with kick off set for 6 p.m. Northwest Christian led wire-to-wire in their 36-20 outcome over fourth seeded Pusch Ridge on Saturday evening. With that win the Crusaders improved to 10-0 on the season. Snowflake heads to the title game with a 9-1 mark. In the semi-final Caden Cantrell completed 10 of 16 passes for 144 yards with one interception. Mayson McKinlay had four grabs for 66 yards; Nick McVicker, 2 for 31; Noah Baum, 2 for 27; Caleb Lyman, 1 for 16; and Brimhall had one four-yard catch. Green continued with his strong performances, rolling up 105 yards on 22 totes with two scores. Brimhall had 53 yards on 13 runs also with two scores. Cantrell rushed 13 times picking up 40 yards.
