You couldn’t have written a better script for Saturday’s VHSL Group AA Division 3 football championship game at Lane Stadium in Blacksburg.
The Northside Vikings became the first Roanoke county school to win a state championship in dramatic fashion, squeaking out a 20-17 victory over Bruton High School from Williamsburg in a game that went right down to the final play.
The two unheralded teams – Northside, only two years removed from a 2-8 season, and Bruton, picked by one newspaper to finish near the bottom of their district, fought to a near standstill for 47 minutes, the Vikings clinging to a 20-17 lead. After driving all the way down to the Northside 3-yard line, Bruton (11-3) lined up for a potential game-tying 26 yard field goal, which would send the game into overtime.
The Vikings never let it get to that.
Sophomore Adam Hardister blocked the attempt, and Northside completed one of the more implausible runs to the state title.
“It’s surreal,” Head Coach Burt Torrence said. “It’s still sinking in right now.”
Hardister’s effort is yet another in a long list of clutch plays that played a part in propelling the Vikings to the state championship. In the postseason alone, the Vikings came from behind to win three times, including the title game, where Northside erased a 17-7 third quarter deficit.
“It’s a testament to our kids,” Torrence said. “They had to encounter some adversity early on in the season with some injuries on the offensive side of the ball to our skill players. But they stuck together.”
The Vikings (12-2) ended the season on a nine game winning streak, fueled in part by a close loss to the Salem Spartans at the end of September.
“I would look at that game as kind of a turning point in our season,” Torrence said. “The kids really felt like they outplayed them, but we couldn’t finish the game. Even though we lost, it gave us confidence that we could play well against anyone, and taught us a lesson in playing a full 48 minutes.”
Torrence can also be proud of his team’s dramatic improvement from district also-ran to state champion in only four years. In 2006, the Vikings went 1-9, and followed that up with a 2-8 campaign in 2007. But the coach says his players never quit.
“The players and the staff all had a vision, and kept moving towards it, and they never swayed,” he said. “They knew they had the makings of a special team this season, maybe even a championship team.”
By Matt Reeve [email protected]