Susan Harman

Your Prep Sports

NORTH LIBERTY – This really wasn’t a single football game.

Liberty High and Cedar Falls went back and forth taking turns scoring, and even when the Bolts went ahead by a touchdown with 20 seconds left the lead wasn’t safe.

But Liberty (3-1) prevailed, 49-42, and set off a huge Homecoming celebration in the middle of the field.

Liberty High scored a touchdown every time it had the ball but once, and that was a missed 42-yard field goal at the end of the first half.

Cedar Falls scored a touchdown every time it had the ball except twice: its first drive that stalled on the Bolts’ 44 when Sutton Koller knocked away a fourth-down pass and then early in the fourth quarter when Liberty High junior Logan Laubenthal intercepted a fade pass in the end zone.

The Tigers were stymied at the end of the game when the Bolts left them only 20 seconds on the clock to get a tying score.

“The pick, that was really the biggest play of the game,” Koller said.

“That was huge; it turned the tide in the game. It was awesome,” Liberty High quarterback Reece Rettig said.

To set the scene, Liberty High was ahead 27-21 late in the third quarter after a 12-play, 65-yard drive.

The Bolts tried an onside kick, but the Tigers’ Alex Weigel recovered at the 46.

In three plays the Tigers advanced to Liberty’s 9-yard line when the fade pass to the end zone was called.

Laubenthal was one-on-one with the receiver.

“I knew it was either a fade or an out,” Laubenthal said.

He took off running toward the receiver, who was behind him.

“I heard the crowd yell ‘ball,’ turned my head and it fell right into my lap,” Laubenthal said. “Whenever a ball goes up everyone yells ‘ball,’ and that’s when I knew. My eyes lit up, and it just fell into my lap.”

The interception gave Liberty a chance to fatten its lead, and it did with a 7-play, 80-yard TD drive.

Dallas Miller reached to snag a pass from Rettig and took it 43 yards across the field for a TD. Rettig then ran in a 2-point conversion to make up for an early blocked PAT, and Liberty High was in the driver’s seat 35-21 with 7:36 left in the game.

Or so it seemed.

It took Cedar Falls less than 2 minutes to score on a 72-yard drive with Davarrion Clark running the final 10 yards for the TD.

The elusive Clark piled up 203 yards and two TDs.

Undeterred, Liberty High drove 80 yards in five plays to lead 42-28.

Koller’s 60-yard run for the score came with just 2:52 left

“I hit the hole really hard and it’s there, and I said I’m taking this all the way to the house,” he said.

That score seemed like it would put an end to this nonsense.

But no.

The Tigers scored in 31 seconds on four passes, with Josh Grete catching the 28-yard TD from Leyton Wolf.

The big blow came with an onside kick bouncing off the turf.

The Tigers’ Ian Fuchtman recovered on Liberty’s 40.

Four plays later (Clark accounted for all but two of the yards) the Tigers tied it at 42.

Only 1:41 remained. Surely the game was ticketed for overtime.

But no.

You have to stick a fork in this Liberty High outfit and even then it likely wouldn’t stop them.

Rettig masterfully directed the winning drive.

Eight plays, 80 yards and fittingly Rettig’s decision to take the ball up the middle on the read option gave the Bolts the winning score with just 20 seconds left.

“We were just believing in all of our guys and believing in our quarterback,” Koller said.

“He’s a very smart guy,” Laubenthal said of Rettig. “He trusts everybody. All he knows is how to win games.”

“I give credit to the running backs,” Rettig said. “They run so hard that it just opens it up for me. They’re going to crash on the running backs all day, so I have easy running lanes.”

The Bolts never relinquished the ball the whole game.

“We didn’t feel like we should,” Rettig deadpanned. “We have great play calls, a great O-line and when everything is working you’re not going to stop us.”

The offensive line of Jaryn Sertterh, Cole Peden, Chase Schroeder, Erick Arzu and Caleb Burnett was dominant.

“We talk about it a lot,” Liberty coach Scott Chandler said. “We’ve got to find a way, and we’ve got to finish. I can’t say enough about our guys. We’ve got a great core group. And the guys who don’t get their names in the paper, they’re coming out and working just as hard. Our offensive line was really good tonight.”

Owen Drapeaux was a workhorse with 18 carries for 92 yards and two TDs.

Koller said the team has all the confidence in the world in the offense’s ability to execute, even under the extreme conditions presented by this game.

“Our quarterback can scramble and he can throw; he can do anything,” Koller said. “It’s just hard to keep up with our offense; we have too many players. We just have a dynamic offense; it’s unstoppable.”

                                                   CF                  ICL

First downs                             23                    25

Rushing-yards                         30-202             38-282

Comp-Att-Int                           19-26-1           23-28-0

Passing yards                          275                  273

Total yards                               477                  555

Punts-avg.                               0                      0

Fumbles-lost                           0                      0

Penalties-yards                       2-22                 3-35

Cedar Falls    0  14   7   21  –  42

Liberty High 7   6   14  22  –  49

ICL – Owen Drapeaux 4 run (Collin Weis kick)

CF – Trey Reuter 16 pass from Leyton Wolf (Cael Harms kick)

ICL – Landon Bell 5 pass from Reece Rettig (kick blocked)

CF – Davarrion Clark 47 run (Harms kick)

ICL – Drapeaux 2 run (Weis kick)

CF – Brady Kies20 pass from Wolf (Harms kick)

ICL – Reece Rettig 1 run (Weis kick)

ICL – Dallas Miller 57 pass from Rettig (Rettig run)

CF – Clark  10 run (Harms kick)

ICL – Sutton Koller 60 run (Weis kick)

CF – Josh Grete 28 pass from Wolf (Harms kick)

CF – Wolf 2 run (Harms kick)

ICL – Rettig 7 run (Weis kick)

Individual statistics 

RUSHING – CF: Davarrion Clark 22-209, Ben Backes 2-5, Will Remmert 1-(-3), Layton Wolf 4-(-9). ICL: Sutton Koller 8-109, Owen Drapeaux 18-92, Reece Rettig 10-76, Dallas Miller 2-5.

PASSING – CF: Wolf 19-26-1-275. ICL: Rettig 23-28-0-273.

RECEIVING – CF: Trey Reuter7-118, Carsten Meester 4-59, Josh Grete 2-44, Brady Kies 1-20, Backes 2-16, Remmert 1-4. ICL: Dallas Miller 5-88, Collin Decker 10-84, Koller 4-42, Logan Laubenthal 1-24, Landon Bell 2-24, Jordan Schroeder 1-11.

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