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"Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play."
- Mike Singletary
The River Valley football team has one more chance to have that opportunity and that is today.
The Blackhawks take on the Saint Croix Central Panthers in a battle for the state title at the Home of the Badgers, Camp Randall Stadium. It is a great venue and the match-up is shaping up to be a great game.
The Blackhawks were the number one seed in the Division 4 bracket and came through it, proving their ranking.
Saint Croix Central was the fourth seed and came through their bracket beating defending state champion Osceola along the way. In making it to the title game the Panthers eliminated two number one seeds and one second seed.
As coach Time Eastlick said, "They are bigger but athlete for athlete we match up pretty well."
This is the first ever trip to the title game for the Blackhawks and the Panthers last appeared in 1988. So it will be relatively new territory for both teams.
"It is an honor and privilege to play in the D4 Championship game," Eastlick said. "Our entire school district is a buzz with the excitement and opportunity that is out there for our boys."
Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.
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The Blackhawks got a preview of playing on artificial turf and had few problems taking care of Two Rivers Friday at Hartland Arrowhead.
Quarterback Elijah Alt kicked it into a higher gear to run and pass the Blackhawks to a 34-12 win.
The defense also gave the Raiders a rough night on all but two drives in the third quarter when Two Rivers scored on back to back possessions.
Neither team scored in the first quarter but Alt wasted no time getting points on the board for River Valley in the second frame. He capped a drive with a two yard run at 11:27 for a 6-0 lead.
After trading fumbles with Jordan Slaney getting the ball back for the Blackhawks, Alt picked up nine yards, taking the ball to the Two Rivers 30. After a holding penalty on the Raiders Alt fired an eight yard strike to Brett Nachreiner with 5:58 left in the half then added the conversion with a pass to Derek Wedige.
The half ended with both teams trading possessions and an interception by Ryan Wickman ended a Two Rivers threat.
Two Rivers was able to sustain a pair of early drives in the third quarter and pulled to within two at 14-12.
Their first score came at 8:40 after a 10 play drive when Dawson Kiphart threw three yards to Darquise Winters for the first Two Rivers score.
The next Raiders possession also resulted in a score, this time after 13 plays. Senior running back Darrin President punched it in from the five with 2:46 left.
After that the River Valley defense took over.
"Our team defense is selling out every game and playing great as a team," Eastlick said. "They rally to the ball and are executing the game plan very well night in and night out. Coaches Kevin Billington, James Russell and Dan Machovec are doing a really good job with this group."
The Blackhawks also were able to contain the Two Rivers passing attack.
"They were able to move the ball a bit with the pass, but overall we did a really good job limiting the big pass plays," Eastlick said.
After Wickman returned the ball to the 38 the Blackhawks scored after seven plays. A pass to Brett Nachreiner got the ball to the 25 then Alt linked up with Justin Yanke for a 25 yard scoring strike. That moved the score to 20-12. with two seconds left in the third frame.
Alt and company put the game away with two scores in the fourth quarter. With 8:43 left Alt passed to Nachreiner for the second score and hit Yanke for the conversion.
He put up the last score himself with 6:56 left after taking a zig zag route in from the 28.
In between those two scores the Blackhawks got a big play from Billy Schluter who sacked Kiphart at midfield. That gave the Hawks the ball for their final score.
"Billy had a great night on the defensive line," Eastlick said. "He plays with good pad level and is always trying to work to the ball."
After taking over on downs with 2:54 left the Hawks wound down the clock until Alt could take a knee the final two plays to kill the clock.
Alt had another monster night for the Blackhawks, taking part in all five touchdowns. He completed 10 of 20 passes for 177 yards and three touchdowns while running for 225 yards on 32 attempts and two scores.
"Elijah is a competitor and has a big motor," Eastlick said. "He is well conditioned as are the other athletes on our team, so that they can play at a high level for four quarters."
Eastlick said several Blackhawks came up big in the game.
"Nachreiner and Yanke had key catches that resulted in scores that were big momentum bumps for us." said Eastlick. "There were two other key pass plays: one to Ryan Wickman early that he just went up and got the ball. The other to Shane Liegel were he turned a slant into a 38 yard gain. Our offensive line did a good job giving Elijah time to get the ball out."
All of the point after attempts by the Hawks were tries for two point conversions. There was reason for that.
"Unfortunately, our holder, Nate Jennings was injured," Eastlick said. "At that point in the game we weren't comfortable with putting in a young man that hadn't done any holding in a game."
Tonight's game has the two teams with one common opponent, Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau. The Blackhawks lost 21-20 on a missed two point conversion against GET in an early non-conference game while Saint Croix Centeral beat them 41-20 in the play-offs. Eastlick doesn't feel that has much of an impact.
"SCC is a team that is physical and likes to run the ball and play ball control offense," Eastlick said. "Defensively they are solid and have good size and team speed. It should be a great game."