Rigby pulls off near-miraculous late-game victory to conclude Rocky Mountain Rumble

POCATELLO — The Rigby Trojans were staring an upset defeat in the face. With 14 seconds left in a tied game, the Woods Cross Wildcats lined up for a 30-yard potential game-winning field goal.

Rigby needed a miracle.

That miracle came, though, in the form of senior defensive back Cannon Korth, who broke through the left side of the Wildcat front to block the field goal attempt. Kobe Walker, another senior DB, scooped the loose pigskin and nearly returned it to the endzone for the go-ahead touchdown.

“I just thought, ‘I’ve got to make this play.’ That’s all that was going through my head,” Korth said about the outcome-altering block. “It was crazy, I was ready for (Walker) to go down and score, but unfortunately, he ran into me.”

A collision between Walker and Korth, the product of Korth’s hustle to get downfield in search of a Wildcat to block, resulted in Walker being taken down at the Woods Cross 33 yard line.

Then, on the final play of the game, senior quarterback Jake Flowers hit junior Evan Freeman for a game-winning touchdown. Just like that, with a mere 14 seconds coming off the clock, the Trojans (2-0, 0-0) had gone from staring defeat in the face to the utter jubilation of an improbable 33-27 victory.

Korth and senior running back Amani Morel, together, struggled to verbalize the emotions they felt watching Freeman cross the goalline as he pulled Flowers’ perfect dime.

“I saw (Freeman) down the sideline, he beat (the defender) and caught it, and I was just like, ‘Yooooo,'” Morel said as Korth, standing next to him, laughed.

Under head coach Armando Gonzalez, the Trojans have built a tradition of defense and physicality. So it is perhaps surprising that the Rigby defense was physically punished by the Wildcats and running back Viliami Tapa’atoutai.

Tapa’atoutai, the fullback and first man to the ball in Woods Cross’ triple-action offense — which Gonzalez said he had never coached against before — toted the rock 23 times for 121 yards. He added an 11-yard touchdown catch to tie the game, 27-27, with just over nine minutes remaining in the game.

But, as Gonzalez was quick to point out after the game, the Rigby defense, despite the difficulties it battled through all game, made the stops when they were needed.

“We had a pretty good idea and a good plan, but that 32 (Tapa’atoutai) is a pretty big back, and, like Amani, he was hard to tackle, made us work,” Gonzalez said. “But I told the kids, ‘We’ve just got to outlast them.'”

It was Tapa’atoutai, who avergaed 5.3 yards per carry for the game, that the Trojans stopped for no gain on second down with 22 seconds remaining to set up the field goal attempt two plays later.

Like Gonzalez said, Morel played the part of Rigby’s beast back.

Morel, whom an Instagram account associated with Woods Cross poked fun at earlier in the week, carried the ball 14 times for 113 yards and a score, and added five catches for 46 yards and another score.

After the game, Morel admitted that the social media post “ticked him off” at first, but that he didn’t use it as any added fuel to his performance, calling Saturday’s game “just another game.”

“Everyone’s going to hate on Rigby, that’s just how it is,” he said. “You just can’t let it bother you at all. If you need extra heat from people talking hate on you, that doesn’t do you any good — you should go into every game with energy already.”

Korth described the feeling of being on the sideline as Morel is grinding opponent defenses down.

“When we give Amani the ball, I know we’re getting extra yards every time,” he said.

Gonzalez spoke highly of Morel and his backfield mate, Flowers.

“He’s really come a long way, as a young man,” Gonzalez said. “He’s a big part of our offense and, when it comes down to it, with him and Jake (Flowers), I think we’ve got a good shot.”

Flowers was spectacular in the first half, but a bit less so after the break. In fact, before connecting with Freeman on the final play of the game, he had thrown six straight incomplete passes.

Gonzalez said Flowers will be disappointed with himself while watching film, seeing the passes he missed. But, like his defense, Gonzalez pointed to the signal-caller’s poise when the game was on the line.

Flowers completed 16 of 27 pass attempts for 221 yards and four touchdowns.

Korth’s block was not his only key contribution with time expiring. He was also responsible for turning the Wildcats away as time dwindled in the first half, snatching an interception at the Rigby 10 yard line with less than a minute remaining in the second quarter.

“These are the kinds of games that prepare us for down the road, when we get to conference play. We’ll be ready when we get there,” he said.

Gonzalez said that Rigby’s upcoming schedule will be tough, with three tough opponents leading into conference play, where Highland and Madison await in back-to-back weeks.

“I told the team, ‘My goal over the next three or four weeks is to find out how mentally and physically tough we are,” the coach said.