WOOSTER — The conclusion of Friday’s stirring OHSAA Division V regional semifinal football game between No. 2 seed Triway and No. 3 seed Genoa Area was on the verge of reaching it’s ending.
The contest between the two 10-1 teams and league winners needed overtime to decide who was heading to next week’s regional final. After Genoa Area received the ball first (started on the 20-yard line) and scored a touchdown in overtime for a seven-point lead, it was Triway’s turn, where wide receiver Bruin Flinner scored up the gut on a Wildcat run to trim the lead to one point.
Then it came.
With most people in the stadium thinking Triway would kick the extra point to tie the game up and extend the contest into double overtime, the Titans had other plans. They sent their offense out there to go grab the win by going for the two-point conversion. On a double-reverse, Triway was stopped on a run from Flinner that he tried cutting up the middle on and the game was over.
Genoa Area 34. Triway 33.
“Something we run everyday at practice all year. When we get teams that run man-to-man like they do, we felt like we had a mismatch on a quarterback getting out there,” said Triway head coach Cody Kelly, explaining his decision to go for the two-point conversion to win it in overtime. “At the end of the day, it didn’t work. That’s on me. I don’t feel bad about going for it there. That’s who we are. We’re aggressive.”
To dive more into the why Kelly decided to go for the two-point conversion, stems some from Triway getting a PAT blocked after tying the game up 27-27 late in the fourth quarter which would have given the Titans a one-point lead.
“We had a PAT blocked there,” Kelly added. “That seals the game if it’s blocked again. We didn’t feel confident doing it again, so we wanted to go for it. Looking back, I can second guess it all I want but we made the call and it didn’t go our way.”
“We were talking about it and we truly believe we could go win the game,” said Flinner. “We ran a Philly Special. I got the reverse and I saw the safety carrying our quarterback, so I knew the pass wasn’t open. I tried to make a run for it and find a gap. I hit it and came up short.”
In a game that Triway trailed the entire way (was down 14-0 in the first eight minutes) and featured three ties, the four turnovers they committed really hurt them (Genoa Area recovered three fumbles in first three quarters and quarterback Luke Starr threw a last-minute interception on a heave pass on the last play in regulation) but the Titans dug back into it everytime they fell behind, as they forced two turnovers themselves, both in the fourth quarter alone.
Especially working for the Titans offensively was the Wildcat offense that they first debuted in last week’s second round playoff win, where Flinner was utilized to the maximum scoring five rushing touchdowns, which were mostly on short-yardage situations.
“I’m proud of the guys for getting back into it,” Kelly said. “We had a lot of things not go our way. A couple of balls batted up in the air that didn’t go our way. Second half, we fought. We had a chance to tie it up and a chance to take the lead on a PAT and missed it.”
“From Week 1, we’ve had a lot of close games. We knew the whole key was never giving up,” Flinner said, who also intercepted a pass in the last seconds in the fourth quarter. “We came out of halftime, they got a turnover. We knew if we just kept battling we’d be there at the end. We were there at the end but they just made more plays then we did.”
Afterwards, Kelly focused on Triway’s 10-2 season where they were one of the top teams in Division V, which he acknowledged was one of the best in school’s history.
“Proud of the seniors for turning around the program. It starts with them,” said Kelly. “I told them to don’t hold your heads. We’ve done things here we’ve never done. We’ve never been in this situation. It doesn’t take away who they are and what they mean to this program and community.”
“We were definitely thinking about state,” said Flinner. “We had the second-best record in school history and went as far as any team has ever went. We didn’t get to where we want but it was a successful season.”
jamessimpson@gannett.com
Twitter/X: @JamesSimpsonII
This article originally appeared on The Daily Record: In stirring regional semifinal, Triway come a cut short in overtime loss to Genoa Area
Reporting by James Simpson II, Wooster Daily Record / The Daily Record
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