Grafton lets one get away at rival Cedarburg

A career-high in yards rushing by Tommy Lutz wasn’t enough to carry the Grafton High School football team to victory at Cedarburg last Friday.

The Bulldogs scored all of their points in the final 12 minutes and 12 seconds and pulled out a 21-20 nail-biter when a Black Hawks’ field goal attempt failed on the game’s second-last play.

“Three interceptions, lot of penalties, a lot of things that are controllable,” Grafton coach Jim Norris said of his team’s play.

“Everything I saw tonight’s correctable. It’s just a matter of if the seniors and the leadership and coaching staff wants to go get after it and correct those little things.”

Lutz, who led the Woodland Conference in rushing last season, ran 31 times for 295 yards and two touchdowns, including an 80-yard burst in the first half in which he was barely touched.

“He’s a dude for a reason. The other guys gotta be dudes too,” Norris said.

With 4 minutes 50 seconds to go, right after Luke Leair caught a 12-yard touchdown pass down the middle, the Hawks led 20-14. All they had to do was run out the clock.

On second and 10, quarterback Brady Hilgart was pressured and rolled right. He tossed a pass that Vincent Rosenberg picked off by diving ahead of a Black Hawk.

Cedarburg had the ball at the Grafton 39-yard line with 4:29 left.

The Hawks’ defense stood tough on three downs. On fourth and nine from the 38, quarterback Alex Evanoff dropped the shotgun snap, rolled left and pitched the ball. Logan Zahour caught it and lofted a rainbow toward the middle of the field to a streaking Mason Schultz. Grafton’s Jack Nelson closed quickly, but Schultz hung on to the ball in the end zone. Aidan McCoy’s extra point gave the Bulldogs their first lead with 3:02 to play.

The Hawks’ offense, which had sputtered much of the half — after one three-and-out Norris told his players, “We need a drive. Find a way,” got going when it needed it most.

Lutz was the offense at that point, and he ran eight times for 57 yards on the final 12-play, 65-yard drive that reached the Bulldogs’ 15-yard line with 5.8 seconds left. The Hawks lost several seconds on the drive when the clock didn’t stop to let the chains move on a first down, and they tried a field goal to win it.

Gavin Lempke slightly bobbled the snap, kicker Noah Anderson had a slight hitch and the Bulldogs blocked the kick.

It was bedlam for Cedarburg and hundreds of fans who attended on the Bulldogs’ youth night.

“We left a lot on the field,” Norris said.

“Hats off to them. They had a great game plan. They beat us when it mattered in some critical situations.”

“We had that,” last season’s Woodland Conference Co-Lineman of the Year James Nellis said. “We had opportunities. We just didn’t execute. We had a lot of offensive penalties.”

Hilgart, named an all-state honorable mention last season, went 11-for-22 for 123 yards with a touchdown and three interceptions.

“There’s always unknowns going into Game 1,” Norris said. “Some newer, younger guys rotate into the mix. It’s building confidence in those guys. They’ve just got to find their groove in game-type situations.”

Lempke caught three balls for 39 yards and Lutz caught three for 25. Tyler Van Sluys caught two passes for 25 yards, including a 16-yard touchdown while streaking down the left sideline on a perfectly placed pass.

Van Sluys had eight tackles, Max Glab had seven and Nellis had five. Jeremy Dickerson Jr. picked off a pass in the first half. Jack Marti, Colton Boehlke and Ian Cornelius each had a sack.

For Cedarburg, Evanoff went 22-for-35 for 222 yards with a touchdown and an interception.

Spencer Strum ran 13 times for 123 yards and a score, getting Cedarburg on the board on the second-last play of the third quarter with a 60-yard burst. Logan Zahour ran six times for 52 yards and caught four balls for 48 yards. Schultz caught five for 59 and a score, Robert Piskula caught five for 78 yards and Leair six for 52 yards and a score.

The Black Hawks held a 14-0 halftime lead that could have been more. The Bulldogs picked off a pass down the middle of the field when the Hawks had moved to the 35-yard line, and Lucas Peterman leaped high to snag a ball out of the air at the goal line after the Hawks advanced to the Bulldogs’ 16-yard line.

The Bulldogs threatened to score often throughout the game, but the Hawks kept them out of the end zone for nearly the entire first three quarters. Fourth-down passes fell incomplete from the Hawks’ 34 and 18-yard lines, and sacks and penalties moved the Bulldogs from first and goal at the 6 to fourth and goal from the 46, leading to a punt.

Grafton hosts rival Port Washington on Friday. The Hawks lost to the Pirates during the regular season last year but beat them in Port, 22-21, in the second round of the playoffs. Cedarburg plays at Wauwatosa West.