Paola edges Louisburg in rivalry contest

By Andy Brown
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Updated: September 29, 2015

Louisburg’s Cole Kramer pins the ball to the back of a Paola defender Friday at Wildcat Stadium. Kramer later came down with the catch and ran for a 62-yard touchdown. It was the Wildcats’ lone touchdown in the 11-10 loss to Paola.

Friday night’s homecoming matchup between the Louisburg and Paola football teams was much of the same the two fan bases have enjoyed in recent years.

It was a close, hard-hitting, grind it out football game.

Unfortunately for the Wildcats, the result wasn’t any different.

Thanks to a fourth quarter touchdown and 2-point conversion, Paola edged Louisburg 11-10 at Wildcat Stadium for the Panthers’ fifth-straight victory over the Wildcats. Louisburg had the ball two different times late in the fourth quarter to try and win it, but both drives came up empty.

“It was a classic Louisburg/Paola football game,” Louisburg coach Kyle Littrell said. “Both teams played hard and physical, but the difference was Paola made one more play than we did. Both defenses played well, but they shut our run game down completely and it was hard for us to get anything going.”

After rushing for more than 300 yards the week before against Piper, the Wildcats (3-1) managed just 29 yards on the ground and they didn’t have many holes to run through.

Louisburg looked to quarterback Austin Terry as he opened up the offense through the air and gave the Wildcats a lot of momentum going into halftime thanks to the hands of his receiver Cole Kramer.

Late in the second quarter, Terry lofted a pass down the sideline and Kramer reached over a Paola defender to try and make the catch. As Kramer came down with it, he pinned the ball to the back of the Paola defender, maintained control and raced 62 yards for the Wildcats’ lone touchdown and a 7-3 halftime lead.

Mason Koechner (53) signals Louisburg ball while T.J. Dover holds the ball up after he recovered a fumble Friday in Louisburg.

“It was a fantastic catch by Cole and that did give us a lot of momentum going into halftime, which was something we needed because we couldn’t get much going on offense,” Littrell said. “With his speed, Cole is able to get behind most defenders he plays against and he did a great job of making that catch.”

Offense was hard to come by in the first half as Paola dominated the time of possession. The Wildcats had just three offensive plays in the first quarter and another 12 in the second quarter.

Despite that, the Louisburg defense held strong and kept the Panthers at three points until the fourth quarter. It was the Wildcats defense that gave their team ample opportunity to put the game up two scores late in the third quarter.

Junior lineman T.J. Dover forced, and recovered a fumble at Paola’s 20-yard line and gave the Wildcat offense their best field position of the night. It looked like they were going to take advantage as Terry scrambled for what appeared to be a touchdown run

However, the score was called back due to a holding penalty and the Paola defense held, forcing a field goal. Senior Alex Dunn connected on the 35-yard field goal to give Louisburg a seven-point lead.

“That was a big sequence there for us,” Littrell said. “A touchdown would have put us up 14-3, and the way we were playing, I think that might have been enough and it would have forced Paola to do some different things on offense.

“Looking at the hold on tape, it looked very minimal to me, but you have to go with what the official called and we needed to do a better job of executing.”

Paola got new life and they took advantage. The Panthers went on a 14-play drive, that ate up nearly seven minutes on the clock to start the fourth quarter, and scored on a Ryan Gleghorn 2-yard touchdown run.

The Panthers lined up for the extra point to tie the game with five minutes remaining, but Louisburg was called for offsides, which moved the ball close to the 1-yard line. Paola elected to go for the 2-point conversion and got it to take the 11-10 lead.

Louisburg was able to drive the ball to midfield on its next possession after a couple of completions from Terry to Mitchell McLellan, but the Wildcats eventually turned the ball over on downs.

The Wildcat defense forced the Panthers to punt one last time and got the ball back with a little more than a minute remaining. But with no timeouts, Louisburg didn’t have enough time left.

Seniors Ben Brummel and Cate Stambaugh were crowned the 2015 Fall Homecoming King and Queen before Friday’s game with Paola.

“The play calling at the end of the game wasn’t very good and that is my fault,” Littrell said. “It was just hard to get into any kind of rhythm when we didn’t have the ball that much. We just couldn’t get Paola off the field and they did a good job running the ball and eating up a lot of clock.”

Louisburg will try and get back on the winning track Friday when it travels to Baldwin for another Frontier League matchup. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.

PAO 3 0 0 8 – 11

LOU 0 7 3 0 – 10

First quarter

P: 29-yard FG

Second quarter

L: Cole Kramer 62 pass from Austin Terry (Alex Dunn kick)

Third quarter

L: Alex Dunn 35 FG

Fourth quarter

P: Ryan Gleghorn 2 run (Gleghorn run)

STATISTICS