Nearly every morning during the school week one year when they were students at Newport Central Catholic High School, Randy Borchers pulled into Eddie Eviston’s driveway on Crowell Avenue in Fort Thomas and honked his horn. The Eviston’s home was a short trip from Borchers’ house less than a mile away.
“Randy lived on the first street across the bridge between Highland Heights and south Fort Thomas on the Highland Heights side,” Eviston said. “We were on the second street across the bridge on the south side of Fort Thomas.”
Coach Borchers and coach Eviston were friends and football teammates at NewCath. At that time, they had no idea that nearly 30 years later, both would be coaching high school football teams in Kentucky state championship games on the same weekend for the second time. Eviston’s unbeaten 14-0 Covington Catholic Colonels play unbeaten 14-0 Boyle County in the Class 4A title tilt on Friday at 8 pm. Borchers’ 12-2 Cooper Jaguars take on 11-3 Bowling Green in the Class 5A championship game at 8 pm on Saturday. Both games are at Kroger Field in Lexington.
“My brother and I were two of five kids in our family, and my dad was always working, so we would have to bum rides quite often from our friends because mom was taking the other kids somewhere,” Eviston recalled of his high school years. “We were fortunate to have a lot of friends with vehicles that were going in our direction, so it worked out.”
It was the school year of 1994-95. Borchers, a high school junior at the time, would sit behind the wheel of his white, two-door Chevrolet Cavalier that was parked in the Eviston’s driveway and wait on his passengers to hop in. He was friends with the Eviston boys and was their somewhat regular morning ride to school.
But this is where things get a little hazy for Eviston who admits he doesn’t remember those mornings quite as well as Borchers because Borchers was alert and driving and Eviston was still practically half-asleep when he piled into the car.
“We all were like zombies a bit in the morning. I did not talk too much,” Eviston said. “Not quite sure, but I want to say he picked us up around 7:40-7:45 am. I think school started at 8. He would just pull in the driveway and wait on us to come out. I usually was ready and could see him pull in, and I would go out to the car. My brother Brian was sometimes running a little behind and would come out a few minutes later. Only took us about 6-8 minutes to get to school.”
Borchers recalls it a little differently.
“I have always hated to be late, so I was always at their house by 7:30 blowing the horn. Their sister would always be out right away and then Brian would be out shortly after,” Borchers said. “Not sure what window Eddie was looking out, but he was always the last one out of the house. I do believe he is telling the truth about not coming out until 7:45 or so but that was usually 10-15 minutes after I pulled up. It was a tight squeeze. I do recall Brian going in the back a good amount because he was usually out before Eddie.”
Eviston welcomes the gentle correction to his recollection. After all, he and Borchers have been friends for three decades going back to when they were fellow Thoroughbreds on the NewCath football team for legendary coach Bob Schneider. Back then, Borchers was more of a morning person than Eviston, who now gladly defers to Borchers on time-worn morning memories such as what went down during those short car rides to school.
“The radio was probably on. WEBN radio station was pretty popular,” Eviston said. “Van Halen, Nirvana, Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, that was the music I can remember, but a better question for Randy. The driver always controls the tunes.”
Borchers remembers the radio.
“I do recall a lot of WEBN in the morning,” he said. “We were 16 and 17 years old so we were never real serious at 7:30 in the morning.”
Eventually, Borchers’ neighborly services were no longer required by the Eviston brothers and their sister.
“Drove them, Brian and I my junior year which was the 1994-95 school year,” Borchers recalled. “Drove them most of the ’95 football season and then Brian got his own car and began driving them so they no longer needed me.”
Borchers graduated from NewCath in 1996. Ten years later, he was Ludlow’s head football coach for two years beginning in 2006 and became the first and only head football coach at Cooper in 2008. In quick order, he had the Jaguars in the 2012 Class 5A state championship game. Fast forward to 2023 and he and the Jaguars are back in the title game. Borchers nailed down his 100th career win in this season’s playoffs first round game against Collins.
Eviston, who has over 130 career wins, graduated from NewCath in 1997 and starred at quarterback for Georgetown College, where he set school passing records and led the Tigers to back-to-back NAIA national championships in 2000-01. He was a three-time NAIA player of the year. After Georgetown, Eviston tried out for an NFL team, played United Indoor Football then returned to NewCath as an assistant football coach. He eventually became NewCath head coach and won a pair of state championships in 2010 and 2012, the second one in 2012, the same year Borchers’ Jaguars lost to Bowling Green in the 5A final.
Eviston returned to Georgetown as offensive coordinator and stayed two years before becoming head coach at CovCath in 2014. He is seeking his fifth state championship, third at CovCath. The Colonels are trying to win their first since 2019 when they went 15-0. Borchers and Cooper are looking for their first state title.
“We were both fortunate to take our teams to state back in 2012. It’s cool to do it again,” Eviston said. “Randy has been doing this thing longer than I have and the job can be very difficult and many times you question yourself on why you keep doing it, so I am glad to see him continue fighting the good fight to make a positive impact on kids and to see his hard work and dedication be the catalyst for the success of his football program.”
Borchers echoed the same sentiments.
“It’s very cool to be on the same stage as another former teammate and friend,” said Borchers. “Over the past few years, we have been in the same district and have had to compete against each other. It’s going to be really cool this year to sit back and watch them play for a state championship.”
Borchers’ squads have taken their lumps from Eviston’s teams of late, but he’d love to see Eviston’s Colonels complete an unbeaten season and take down Boyle County.
“Even though we have not had a lot of success against the Blue Colonels or coach Eviston over the years, I always appreciated what he has accomplished, and I have enjoyed playing against them,” Borchers said. “You know that his teams are going to play the game the right way and represent themselves, the coaching staff and the school with class. People do not understand how hard it is to have the continued success coach Eviston has had and I am hoping he brings another state championship back this year to Park Hills.”