Don’t ever let them tell you sports is about anything other than winning.
In the end, it isn’t.
That’s why it’s so wonderful – and cruel.
Why the Beechwood players were hugging one another, telling their coaches they loved them, pulling up their jerseys as they hugged injured Mitchell Berger so they could show him as they pounded their hearts.
The scoreboard told it all: Beechwood 14, Mayfield 13.
“For you, for you,” one after another of the Tigers’ players said as they hugged the senior out with a knee injury, who was the state’s leading scorer and according to Beechwood Coach Noel Rash its “Mr. Football.”
None of that happens if the extra point attempt by Mayfield’s Lincoln Suiter isn’t rushed thanks to an offline snap that takes a bit longer to get down while Suiter is already in his kicking motion and the ball flutters just off to the left.
No need for the signal. The shriek from the Beechwood crowd, the dominant sound in the crowd of 6,329 at UK’s Kroger Field, made it clear.
With 1:13 left, the Tigers were about to three-peat.
There’s no such word for three straight losses. Or three straight coming-close.
Nor is there any word as to why Beechwood always seems to win these games. Or why Rash is 8-1 in championship games now.
Two years ago, Beechwood blocked the final extra point for a one-point win over Lexington Christian. Last year, it was Beechwood making the final kick – a field goal that provided the winning margin in a 23-21 win over LCA again.
And now for the first time in their three championship games against a Mayfield team that had beaten every sort of adversity in the world after last December’s deadly tornado flattened the town, had gone 14-0 to get here, and then the kick fell off to the left.
Without that, Rash would not have been able to race to the Beechwood stands and lead his kids in a joyous rendition of the fight song.
“It’s something we pride ourselves on,” Rash said of the special teams’ guys who stepped up like kicker senior Matt Kappes, considering that Berger was also the Tigers’ placekicker.
“I feel terrible for that kid (Suiter) but this didn’t come down to one play,” Rash said.
Mayfield Coach Joe Morris agreed. “They made one more play than we did.”
The same line could have been – and was – the last three years here after the Class 2A championship game.
One more play.
In a game where both coaches were frustrated with their offenses, with the almost unimaginable 18 penalties (Beechwood “won” that contest with 173 yards — you read that right — to 87), and the less-than-sharp officiating, Beechwood made one more play and it made all the difference.
“I thought we had the momentum,” Morris said of why he didn’t go for two at the end and would have been happy going into overtime.
Except for that one last play.
When asked earlier in the week about how the script was already being written for the movie about this Mayfield team that came back from the tornado for a perfect season as they dethroned the two-time defending state champs, Rash stopped the questioner.
“It’s not a movie,” he said, then went there again after the game, talking about “the Hollywood story” before wisely cutting himself off.
Yeah, Hollywood would have had the kick through the uprights and the Cardinals winning in overtime.
Rash explained exactly how tough this ending was for Mayfield. “Remember, this team – these 14-18-year-olds – have to go back to that town,” he said of what will be well more than a decade of rebuilding.
Who couldn’t pull for that ending. But that’s not how sports works.
“We’ll be back,” Morris said, talking for his team and his town.
Whether Rash will be, after his near-perfect career mark in state championship games is the question for another day.
He didn’t want to step on these kids’ amazing story. How they overcame sophomore tailback Chase Flaherty’s injury on the fumble that gave Mayfield a chance in the final minutes.
All the sophomore did was gain 115 yards and run for one TD in an amazing effort replacing Berger these last six games.
All sophomore quarterback Clay Hayden did, coming back from a crack in his femur to start the season, was throw for a TD early to give Beechwood the game’s first lead. He’ll be a lot calmer next year.
“A ‘humdinger’,” KHSAA Commissioner Julian Tackett told Rash that they were looking for in this one.
Not sure if that was the word for it. Heartbreaker might have been closer. For whoever lost this one.
“As many mistakes as we made, our will won out,” Rash said, “our guys just had a little bit more in the tank.”
This might be the reason, two-way tackle/linebacker and MVP Austin Waddell said: “When adversity comes, you just keep playing. And with everything that’s happened . . . ,“ like losing a starting quarterback to start the season and losing Berger for the rest of it, Beechwood just kept playing.
When are you going to have an easy one down here, Rash was asked about Beechwood’s 17th state football championship, third most in Kentucky history.
“It’s been a while,” he said, and then added, “they’re not supposed to be easy.”
No, they’re hard and tough and difficult and when you end up with that one more point on the scoreboard, they’re wonderful things to behold.
Like the way Rash barely made it to the postgame press conference for all the stops he had to make to take photos with friends and family.
“They’re all special,” Rash said of his eight titles, “but when you lose Mr. Football, we’ve never had to deal with that. It’s next man up.”
And the next display in the Tigers’ overflowing trophy case.
By a point.
Which made all the difference.