On Friday night @ The Brickyard, the Brickies squared off with the New Prairie Cougars for just the 5th time in school history with a chance to advance to the IHSAA Sectional finals on the line. The previous 4 matchups between these two programs were an even split with each school winning two. Hobart won the first two ... the 2016 IHSAA Sectional Championship game and the 2019 IHSAA Regional Championship game ... and New Prairie has won the last two ... the 2022 IHSAA Sectional Championship and a 2024 IHSAA Sectional quarterfinal. As you can see, there is always something on the line when these two programs get together. The question is ... who would come out victorious this time around?
The Cougars got the ball first and our Brickie D-D-D-DEFENSE shut down their high-octane offense to force a punt. After a Hobart 3-and-out, senior kicker Zander Lankford launched a punt downfield that was ultimately FUMBLED with Brickie senior Kael Schlosser coming up with the recovery to give the Brickies the ball on the New Prairie 16-yard line!!! On the very next play from scrimmage, senior Willy "The Jet" Shearer ran it in for a Brickie TOUCHDOWN and a 7-0 lead midway through the first quarter!!! After trading punts on the next 4 possessions, New Prairie orchestrated a 59-yd drive that was capped off with a 22-yd rushing touchdown to tie the game at 7-7, which is what the scoreboard showed as the two teams entered the halftime locker rooms. Both squads cranked up the D-D-D-DEFENSE in the 3rd quarter, limiting anything and everything that either offense tried to execute. Heading into the final 12 minutes of play, the score remained tied at 7.
Early in the 4th period, the Brickie special teams unit partially blocked a punt to give the offense GREAT field position ... and OUR BOYS SHINED! With a heavy dose of junior Max Pickett running the ball and some short completions from sophomore QB Aleks Tatum, Hobart moved the ball down inside the New Prairie 10-yd line. With just 6 minutes remaining in the game, Pickett plowed his way into the endzone from 6-yds out to give the Bricks a 14-7 advantage!! When the Cougars got the ball back, they had GREAT field possession thanks to a terrific kick return. Over the course of the next 4 minutes, New Prairie moved the ball down inside the 10 and scored on a 7-yd run to bring the margin within 1 at 14-13. Instead of kicking the extra point, the Cougars decided to go for 2 and in a mass of humanity near the goal line, pushed the ball over for a successful conversion and a 15-14 lead. With just 2 minutes remaining, the Brickies had one more chance and were able to move the ball across the 50, but ultimately turned it over on downs with less than 30 ticks left on the clock.
Final score: New Prairie 15, Hobart 14
It was a heartbreaker to say the least. Our boys played their hearts out on that field against the Class 4A #14-ranked Cougars. It was SO CLOSE ... our boys played INSPIRED FOOTBALL TOGETHER ... just came up 1-point short. One sportswriter even said this after the game, "Hobart literally did everything tonight but win". The end is always tough, but this one hurt a little more after how well our boys played. Still, the Brickies should hold their heads high walking off that field for the final time in 2024. We are VERY PROUD OF THEM!!!
On the ground, Shearer and Pickett combined for 30 carries, 115 yds and 2 touchdowns. Senior Jaelen Williams led the defense with 10 total tackles and a sack ... classmate Dre Castillo finished with 7 tackles and a sack of his own. Even though it ended sooner than we all hoped it would ... looking back, it was another GREAT YEAR for the Brickies - one that included a share of the Northwest Crossroads Conference Championship!! CONGRATULATIONS to Coach Schreiber, his outstanding staff, and all of our boys for a job well done!
#BESETAPART
