Heartbreaking end to a football playoff classic

Two of the top offensive players in the state were the driving force in a game where neither unit could be stopped Friday in a WIAA Division 3 sectional championship thriller at Medford’s Raider Field.

Unfortunately, the home team came up a play short 51-48 to La Crosse Logan, who scored the go-ahead touchdown on a 13-yard pass from Bradley Check to Maxim Roberts with just 21 seconds remaining.

The Raiders knew they’d have their hands full with Check and he was as good as advertised, running for 271 yards and three touchdowns on 37 carries and throwing two 13-yard scores to Roberts while completing nine of 14 passes for 183 yards.

Medford’s offense was only stopped one time before the game’s final minute and got 256 more yards and four touchdowns from its standout running back Paxton Rothmeier. La Crosse Logan’s defensive attention to Rothmeier in the second half, after he ran for 200 yards in the first half, opened up other options including junior running back Evan Czarnezki, who almost was the hero after his 43-yard touchdown run put Medford up 48-43 with 2:52 to play.

But the Rangers broke Medford’s hearts with a 63-yard touchdown drive to steal the sectional plaque in the final seconds.

The Rangers (10-2) advanced to Friday’s state semifinal against Green Bay Notre Dame (12-0) at Wisconsin Rapids. Medford’s tremendous season ended in the third playoff round at 10-2.

“It’s right up there,” Medford head coach Ted Wilson said of this being one of the best high school football games he’s been a part of. “Obviously when you win, it’s better. But as far as entertainment value, as far as kids playing their hearts out, as far as the competition being really good, being a nail-biter from start to finish, you can name all those things. Other than not getting the win, just a great, great football game.”

Medford entered the fourth quarter holding a 42-36 lead after Rothmeier’s 16yard touchdown run with 29 seconds left in the third. The Rangers started the ensuing drive with Check breaking several tackles on a 29-yard run and finished it with Check’s 2-yard touchdown run with 6:27 left. Jacob Hackbarth kicked the extra point to put the Rangers on top 4342.

The Raiders answered with a 78-yard, eight-play touchdown drive, overcoming a penalty in the process. Czarnezki found a crease on the right side and cut back to his left to score the touchdown and finish with 71 yards on his five second-half carries.

“He wasn’t touched. It was very well blocked,” Wilson said of the score. Unfortunately, Medford failed on the twopoint try for the fourth time in seven attempts and that wound up being quite costly.

While the thought certainly crossed some peoples’ minds that Medford scored too quickly, Wilson said as a coach, he couldn’t think that way.

“I’m a believer in scoring when you can score,” Wilson said. “Defense is an important part of the game too. If way find a way to come up with a stop and we go home happy. You gotta play football and you have to find a way to dig in and win.”

Medford wasn’t far from getting that stop.

After taking over on their 37, the Rangers got two first downs, the second of which came on a 23-yard completion from Bradley Check to Owen Check that got the ball to Medford’s 26-yard line with 1:38 left. Bradley Check broke a big run to get inside the five, but it was nullified by a holding call downfield. Check was stopped by Charlie Gierl for a 1-yard gain making it second and 13. An incompletion appeared to make third and long, but a pass interference call that no one on the Medford sideline agreed with gave Logan a first down at the 15 with 47 ticks left.

Bradley Check ran for 7 yards and then hit Owen Check for what appeared to be the go-ahead 8-yard touchdown pass with 27 seconds left. This time, after a lengthy discussion, the officials made the call against Logan, ruling Owen Check was downfield illegally.

Now second and eight, Gierl broke into the backfield and had two handfuls of Bradley Check’s jersey, but Check still got the ball off to Roberts, who had snuck out of the backfield and easily caught the winning touchdown. After the kickoff, Medford had just 16 seconds to go 55 yards and Thomas Check’s interception of Parker Lissner’s desperation pass, just Lissner’s second interception thrown all year, ended all hope.

“We were very, very close,” Wilson said. “You’re not even talking a play away. You’re talking a half a play away from making things happen. You have to find a way. It just is what it is. Sometimes that’s the way it works than you make. That’s unfortunate somebody has to lose but that’s kind of the nature of the beast.”

Back-and-forth offense

Before the last-second interception, each team’s offense was stopped once in the entire game.

Medford won the opening coin toss and deferred, giving Logan the ball to start. The Rangers methodically drove 68 yards on 11 plays and scored the game’s first points on a 5-yard run by Roberts. Rothmeier got the ball on six of Medford’s first seven plays and accounted for 60 the team’s 64 yards on a drive that ended with his 1-yard score and two-point run that tied the game at 8-8.

Check’s 43-yard pass to Hackbarth was the big play in a quick three-play drive that ended with Check’s 2-yard touchdown run. Rothmeier’s 53-yard run set up his 3-yard score on the first play of the second quarter. Rothmeier’s twopoint run put the Raiders on top 16-15.

“I think obviously their best player is Check,” Wilson said. “Our best player is Paxton and we run our offense through him. They run their offense through him. You could just see the two best players on the field for each respective doing whatever they could to lead their team. Both teams had kids playing their hearts out to play another week.”

The Rangers’ next drive was a workman-like 67 yards that ended with Roberts’ first 13-yard touchdown catch. Thomas Check hit Bradley Check with a reverse pass on the two-point conversion. A kickoff out of bounds gave Medford great field position and the Raiders took advantage. A penalty put the Raiders in a fourth-and-seven situation, but they converted as Gierl wheeled out to the right sideline and pulled in a 26-yard touchdown pass from Lissner with 4:37 left in the half. The two-point try failed, keeping Logan in front 23-22.

Check’s 27-yard run set up his 1-yard touchdown with 49 seconds left in the half. Rothmeier’s 28-yard run allowed the Raiders to take advantage of a short squib kick and set up his 15-yard score with 26 seconds left that pulled Medford within 29-28. The Rangers got to Medford’s 35, but two incompletions and a sack from Sawyer Elsner finally gave the Raiders the stop they were looking for, especially knowing they were getting the ball to start the second half.

Unfortunately, that’s where the Raiders had their only punt after picking up one first down. Logan threatened to potentially go up by two scores, but sophomore defensive end Carson Ingersoll got in Check’s face and tipped a short pass that went right to Gierl, who sprinted the other way for a huge 85-yard pick-six. Rothmeier ran in the two-pointer and Medford now led 36-29 with 4:48 left in the third quarter.

“I thought if we could get the back-toback scores there that’d be great,” Wilson said. “That’s one of the reasons why I like to defer to try to get that. But defensively they came out a little hotter than we were offensively to start the half. Granted, we did become the first team to score when Charlie intercepted that pass and ran it back. I kinda thought by punting and then Charlie coming up with that big play we might have swung it where we needed to swing it. But Kudos to them. They’re a senior-led team, their quarterback is a big leader for them and he put everything on his back and they kept going too.”

Two snaps after Gierl’s big play, Check took off on a 54-yard run to Medford’s five. He scored from 3 yards out two snaps later and Hackbarth’s kick tied it at 36-36. Medford countered with a 52-yard, eightplay drive. Rothmeier had a big 13-yard run on third and nine and Czarnezki had 20 yards on two carries preceding Rothmeier’s 16-yard touchdowns.

Medford finished with 341 rushing yards and averaged 9.5 yards per carry. The Rangers had 342 rushing yards with Check and Roberts handling all of the carries. The Rangers had 525 total yards.

“I knew they had a very good offense,” Wilson said. “In full honesty, I completely thought our defense and their defense would play slightly better. It wasn’t just our defense that didn’t play great, their defense didn’t play great either. I had a sneaking suspicion it was going to be a very close game and it was going to come down to one or two mistakes here or there and it did. It just so happened that nobody played any defense.”

Rothmeier finished with a school-record 2,696 rushing yards and school-record 37 rushing touchdowns. His 4,182 career rushing yards ranks second behind 2020 graduate Ean Wilson (4,285), who he likely would have caught with one more game.

“That’s the tough part about it,” Wilson said. “You’re still licking your wounds a little bit. It still hurts. It’s going to forever, that’s just the way it works. As a whole I thought our kids came together well. Our senior class did a great job of leading and being leaders. They’re not necessarily super vocal leaders, but they just put in the hard work and dedication to trying to get better every day. The junior kids came along very well. We threw a couple of sophomores in there that did a good job for us.

“As a whole the kids really came together well. It was a great team, one to put down in the record books. Lots of records were made this year and it’ll be one that we’ll remember for a long time.”

Evan Czarnezki jumps into the arms of Tripp Reamer after Czarnezki's 43-yard touchdown run gave Medford a 48-43 lead over La Crosse Logan with 2:52 left in Friday's WIAA Div. 3 sectional final game. Unfortunately, the Rangers came back and scored with 21 seconds left to win 51-48. MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS