COLORADO SPRINGS – Normally Cam Cooper’s job as a punter is to willingly surrender the ball to the opposing team. At an unexpected time, at the most pressure-filled time of the season, he was thrust into a new role. As quarterback, he had to generate enough offense to ensure that he couldn’t do his primary job for Pine Creek.
And he did just enough.
An injury to starting quarterback Josiah Roy late in the first half, put Cooper under center with the Eagles trailing by a touchdown. He stayed calm, cool and collected – all while handing the ball to Zion Hill as often as he could – to lead Pine Creek to a 10-7 win over defending Class 4A state champion Loveland in the state football quarterfinals.
“It (is tough to put him in there), but you don’t talk about it,” coach Todd Miller said. “You don’t game plan for it. He’s had snaps all season, he knows what we’re doing and he knows the game plan. We didn’t hesitate.”
When Cooper entered the game, the Eagles (10-2 overall) had zero points on the scoreboard and Roy had been the dominant rusher for the team with 75 yards. The Red Wolves (10-2) had taken a 7-0 lead thanks to a Garrett Harstad 10-yard touchdown run.
Cooper’s first play was a handoff to Hill which went nowhere and a field goal attempt was pushed wide right.
The Eagles got on the scoreboard late in the third quarter on a 38-yard field goal from Ian Johnson. But the offense was still struggling to move the ball against a physical Loveland defense. The only way for the Eagles to stay in the game was put up a defensive fight of their own.
They got a big stop on fourth down near midfield and felt like they had a chance to finally make something happen on offense. Cooper ran left on a little speed option play that went for 22 yards and put the Eagles in the red zone.
“He was supposed to pitch that,” Miller said. “Him keeping it was all him.”
Then Hill kept chipping away at yards and getting closer to the goal line. He find broke into the end zone from the 1-yard line to give Pine Creek its first lead of the game with 7:40 left on the clock.
“(The Red Wolves) were dogs, man, and they kept playing until the bitter end,” Hill said. “We had a game plan, we just had to switch it up. Keep pounding, keep doing what we were doing.”
With the lead in hand, the Eagles turned to the defense, the very unit that had held Loveland to just 7 points when they had come into the game averaging over 37 points per game. On the drive, Harstad suffered an injury of his own and had to leave the game.
Backup Trey Olsen then found Brandon Hensel on a 61-yard pass to put the Wolves deep in Pine Creek territory. A first down put them at the 4-yard line, giving them four shots at the end zone with under 2 minutes left on the clock.
The first two rushing attempts went for a total of 2 yards. On 3rd down, sophomore linebacker Jaiden Anetone broke through the line to stop Drew Foley short. On 4th down, a jet sweep to the left side was sniffed out by Brett Alvey. He tackled Tyson Williams at the line of scrimmage giving the ball back to the Eagles and effectively sending them into the semifinals.
“That’s a stop of all-time right there,” Miller said.
It was a comeback of all-time. After losing Roy, the spark of the Eagles offense, winning seemed far-fetched. But the Eagles believed in their freshman quarterback to come in and keep the offense effective enough to get points on the board. He couldn’t produce many, but he stuck to the plan and what he did produce was enough to get the job done.
“It was just pounding the rock and that’s how we got this game done,” Cooper said. “It was amazing. I want to thank my teammates for building me up for this and believing in me.”
Only time will tell if Roy will be healthy enough to take the field next week. But should the Eagles be forced to call on the freshman again, the confidence of beating the defending state champions will be a hard rush to bring him down from. The Eagles head to Jeffco Stadium next weekend to take on Chatfield in the 4A semifinals.