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On paper, the Class 4A football state championship is essentially top-ranked East Central’s to lose.
Unbeaten on the season at 14-0, the Trojans are one of five teams playing at Lucas Oil Stadium this Thanksgiving weekend with flawless records and one of three programs seeking to defend their titles during the 51st annual Indiana High School Athletic Association Football State Finals.
Statistically, the Trojans rank first in points scored per game (49.86), second in points allowed (5.93) and first in margin of victory (43.93), regardless of classification.
East Central is led by Miami (Ohio) commit Josh Ringer, a 6-foot-1, 190-pound, program record-setting senior running back, who has amassed a state-best 2,629 yards rushing on 245 carries and 57 touchdowns overall, including five receiving.
The chatter prior to Saturday’s 3 p.m. state championship showdown with unranked NorthWood (12-2) in downtown Indianapolis has echoed what the numbers have shown, but Panthers head coach Nate Andrews likes the odds, nonetheless.
“It’s a great challenge. You walk in the door here and everybody is saying, ‘Hey, good luck. Glad you got’em and not us.’ Yeah, they’re a machine, well coached, tough, been here before. Done that, but our kids are confident,” said Andrews, a 1996 NorthWood alum. “I don’t know how confident they will be by the end of the week when they keep hearing the same things I’m hearing.”
All Andrews hears is one word: underdog.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve been a true underdog to be honest. We had a great year last year and a great team. A true underdog, it’s been a long time. I don’t know if that’s what we are or not, but (East Central) is one of the best 4A teams the state has ever seen, so it should be fun,” Andrews said.
In seven state championship game appearances since 1980, including their last in 2016, NorthWood has prevailed just once back in 2005, pulling off one of the state’s most notable upsets to win the 3A title over heavily favored Bishop Chatard, 7-0, inside the RCA Dome.
While the modern-day Panthers enter this weekend’s state finals with an obviously contrasting record compared to the 2005 team’s 3-6 record-season mark and eventual 9-6 finale, neither were nor are surefire favorites.
“The program has been here eight different times, been the runner-up in all of the toss-up games or the ones on paper where it was close. We were champions in a game where we were big underdogs, so it would mean a lot to do it again,” Andrews said. “You’re talking about the worst record in program history, and that’s our state championship, which is a huge story in the state of Indiana, so crazier things have happened.”
And those opportunities are never guaranteed.
As a player, Andrews and the Panthers reached the 4A state championship game in 1993 under former coach Rich Dodson, but they lost their only game of the season to unbeaten Roncalli, 14-12. While a high school state champion individually at 171 pounds for NorthWood in 1996, Andrews now has another chance to guide his Panthers to an improbable goal in his 10th year coaching football at his alma mater.
“You don’t realize until you get older how difficult it is to get here, but as a player I can remember making some predictions after walking off the field as a sophomore that I’ll be back. Didn’t make it,” Andrews said. “There are some good teams out there, and you have to have a lot of luck along the way. To be honest in 2016, I thought, ‘You know what? We can make another run here in the next couple of years.’ No. Ran into some good teams and didn’t have luck along the way. Everyone who is here is very fortunate. It’s a great opportunity and a great experience.”
The Class 4A State Championship featuring NorthWood (12-2) and East Central (14-0) will stream via PPV on IHSAAtv.org this Saturday at 3 pm ET / 2 CT!
Neither NorthWood nor East Central are competing merely for the experience, however, and both have proven they equally belong in the spotlight.
En route to their sixth state finals appearance, East Central has been prolific on both sides of the ball. The Trojans have held 12 of 14 opponents to a touchdown or less and have posted six shutouts, including five consecutive. East Central has set nearly every single defensive team record in program history this season.
Offensively, when Ringer hasn’t grabbed the headlines, senior quarterback Cole Burton with his 1,312 yards passing and 21 touchdowns or senior receiver Ryan Brotherton and his 756 yards on 34 catches for 13 touchdowns have.
The team’s 420.9 total yards per game average is a direct result of their multiple offensive schemes and dedication to the process.
“We haven’t talked at all about being undefeated this year. We haven’t talked about being undefeated since game one. It’s just been win that week and put our best foot forward each week. Our program has been 14-0 before in 1994, but they’ve never been 15-0, so our seniors are kind of chasing history,” East Central head coach Jake Meiners said. “They’re just trying to make their mark, and they have one more game to try to do that.”
One more win would lock down East Central’s fourth 4A state title all time since winning their first in 1994 and back-to-back.
“We had a great run last year, had a great team last year, but coming into this year there was a lot of talk about being able to repeat, and we talked early on, we just had to focus on day by day, week by week and just try to get better on a daily basis,” Meiners said.
“You’ve taken everybody’s best shot. I feel like last year, we flew under the radar a little bit until later in the tournament. This year, we’ve had a target on our back since week one, and for a high schooler to honestly have that pressure put on them and be able to deflect that pressure and just focus on football and going out and playing. That’s an incredible feat for this group to do that.”
The task for NorthWood is to crack the Trojans’ hardened bubble of indestructibility.
NorthWood senior quarterback Owen Roeder could be the key with 3,264 yards passing and 38 touchdowns, along with 535 yards rushing and 12 more touchdowns. Junior running back Landon Perry brings 845 yards and nine touchdowns, while senior NiTareon Tuggle leads the receiving corp. with 1,290 yards on 86 receptions and 17 touchdowns.
The Trojans will counter with a stout defense led by senior linebackers Brayden Rouse (97 tackles, 4 sacks), Dylan Maxwell (78 tackles, 10 for a loss) and Connor Kuhn (61 tackles), senior defensive tackle Eli Ertel (51 tackles, 2 sacks) and junior safety Carson Pieczonka (48 tackles, 3 interceptions).
“They’re unique in how they approach each ball game. Each ball game is a little bit unique, and it says a lot about the roots of your program, which is impressive. They don’t make any mistakes, and they just don’t let you score,” Andrews said. “Those are the challenges.”
The state title will come down to the team that successfully overcomes those adversities – numbers aside.
“We have some guys that have been through it, and it’s about how you respond to adversity. To me, that’s what determines a character of a man,” Andrews said.
“We’ve been challenged this year at different points, and those guys have done nothing but overcome those types of obstacles,” Meiners added. “This group has done a great job of kind of avoiding the noise. It’s such a special group because they understand that in order to get the prize, they have to execute each week and get better each week. That’s what they’ve been able to do.”
