Shaw, Lewis and Clark take championship East
DOUG PACEY; The News Tribune
Last updated: December 2nd, 2007 01:24 AM (PST)
“He’s something special,” Tigers coach Tom Yearout said of Shaw through tears.
Unranked Lewis and Clark toppled top-ranked Bothell, 21-14, for the school’s first championship. The title is the first for a Greater Spokane League team since 1997. Bothell lost last season’s final by the same score to Oak Harbor.
“This is just incredible,” said Shaw, a 6-foot-2, 216-pound senior who carried a 4A finals-record 37 times for 176 yards.
Shaw scored the tying touchdown midway through the fourth quarter, but his devastating block on the go-ahead score was just as important.
With barely more than a minute left, the score tied and the Tigers at their own 49-yard line, Lewis and Clark quarterback Taylor Eglet scrambled to his left. The play broke down and receiver Jordan Hanson, playing his first season of football, got behind defensive back Nate Proulx. Eglet saw Hanson, fired a strike on the run and he raced into the end zone for the game-winning touchdown with 1 minute, 1 second remaining.
Eglet said once he saw Hanson beat the defender, he knew what to do.
“Jordan had him and I knew it was a touchdown if I made the throw,” he said.
Bothell’s comeback bid was thwarted when defensive back Levi Taylor intercepted quarterback Johnny Hekker’s pass with eight seconds left.
“We weren’t going to give up,” Hanson said. “We got down early, but we were never out of this game.”
The Tigers (11-2) tied the score when Shaw barreled into the end zone for a 9-yard touchdown with 6 minutes, 10 seconds left to play. Shaw got the ball seven times on the 10-play, 74-yard drive, catching one pass for seven yards and rushing for 43 yards.
“I try to run as hard as I can,” said Shaw, who finished the season with 1,655 yards and 21 touchdowns. “But I’m nothing without my offensive line. I think they’re the best in the state.”
That scoring drive was a response to Bothell’s on the previous possession.
The Cougars (13-1) went ahead 14-7 when Hekker found running back Patrick Otterbech underneath for a 53-yard touchdown pass early in the fourth quarter. The speedy 5-foot-9, 180-pound junior caught the ball at Tigers’ 40-yard line, broke through the middle of the defense and outran the secondary to the end zone.
The touchdown atoned for Otterbech throwing an interception on a halfback pass on Bothell’s previous possession.
Tigers’ cornerback D.J. McNeil intercepted the pass on Bothell’s second possession in the third quarter, but Lewis and Clark couldn’t take advantage.
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Originally published: December 2nd, 2007 01:24 AM (PST)