A few inches is all that stood between a miracle and disappointment for the Tualatin football team Friday night.
Unfortunately for the Timberwolves, they landed on the side of disappointment as their near-miracle walk-off win fell short in the first round of the playoffs. Tualatin’s would-be game-winning touchdown was called back for a penalty, giving the Timberwolves a 44-39 loss Friday night at Mountainside to end their season.
Tualatin trailed by five points, and a defensive stand gave the Timberwolves one last chance to pull off a stunning victory. They got the ball back around midfield with seven seconds left in the game and no timeouts remaining.
Tualatin quarterback Nolan Keeney hiked the ball and dropped back, but didn’t see anyone open at first and was quickly under pressure. He took off, breaking a few tackles and cutting in different directions to keep the play going. As it looked like he would be brought down, he chucked the ball across the field to Trenton Hertzog, who raced 30 yards to the endzone.
While the Tualatin sidelines erupted, one official had already thrown a flag. The refs huddled up for a few minutes and announced the throw from Keeney to Hertzog was a forward pass, nullifying the touchdown. The refs first announced that Tualatin would get one last play with no time left, but then announced since it was a penalty on Tualatin, the violation would instead end the game, and thus, Tualatin’s season.
“It was chaos,” Tualatin’s Calvin Evans said. “We were jumping up and down. To us, of course, it looked legal but the refs called it what they called it, so you can’t change it.”
One big reason Tualatin was in a position to win that game was Evans, who made key plays all over the field in the game. He nailed two field goals from 40-plus years, including a 48-yarder late in the first half, which is a new school record for Tualatin. He pinned Mountainside down at the 1-yard line on a punt late in the fourth to give the Timberwolves a chance to make a defensive stop and get the ball back.
On offense, he lined up under center and rushed in for a score late in the first quarter. He also hauled in a catch on a fake punt pass to extend a drive that led to another Tualatin touchdown. On defense, he chipped in two sacks from the linebacker position.
“He’s one of our captains, and he’s a real leader on this team,” Tualatin Head Coach Dom Ferraro said of Evans. “He leads by example. I’m proud of him because he’s become more vocal.”
Evans is a senior, and Ferraro said he thinks Evans is talented enough to kick in college if he wants. Another senior Ferraro said can have success in college is his starting quarterback Keeney, who is committed to BYU.
“He’s got a really bright future in college. He’s got all the tools. He’s cerebral, he processes well,” Ferraro said.
“I don’t know that I’ve seen a quarterback as athletic as him in my 20 years of coaching.”
That athleticism was on display throughout the game at Mountainside. After Tualatin’s first two drives came up empty, the offense got going right around the same time Keeney started moving around both in the pocket and taking off downfield. On Tualatin’s third drive, Keeney picked up its first first down of the game on a scramble, and scored the Timberwolves’ first score with a touchdown run from about 20 yards out.
“It just happened that way. We tried to run the ball early on with our running backs,” Ferraro said. “We had some quarterback runs for him, so we started going to those and that’s when things opened up for us.”
Tualatin faced a third-and-four from midfield with about 2 minutes left in the first half.
Keeney rolled out to his left and faced a ton of pressure. He danced around behind the line of scrimmage avoiding a few sacks and unfurled a throw downfield to hit Calen Simonelic in stride for a 50-yard touchdown pass.
The Timberwolves’ other scores in the game came on a Zhaiel Smith run in the second quarter and an 81-yard touchdown run by Cole Hachmeister late in the fourth.
Follow Adam Littman Sports on Instagram: tigardlife.com/go/littman
