Comeback falls short for Bears

LAUREL — The Laurel-Concord-Coleridge Bears erased a 24-point deficit with 24 of their own, but Wakefield got the last laugh.

Evan Haisch ran for over 200 yards and scored three touchdowns, but Wakefield had the final say in Thursday’s district showdown, and the Trojans escaped with a 30-24 win over the Bears at Haskell Field.

The Bears had a hard time containing Wakefield back Logan Bokemper, who scored on runs of 22, 53, 19 and 66 yards to stake the visitors to a 24-0 advantage by the early part of the third quarter.

That’s when the Bears mounted their comeback, riding the legs of their top running back, Evan Haisch, who found paydirt on runs of 18, 9 and 2 yards and ran in all three two-point conversions to tie the game at 24-24.

The Trojans turned to senior Justin Erb, who scored on a three-yard run late in the game to break the tie and give the visitors the victory.

“We played a very good and physical team in Wakefield,” LCC head coach Pat Arens said. “In the first half, we struggled with blocking and tackling at times.  It took us a while to make the right adjustments but when we got things figured out, we got back in the game. I think we showed a lot of heart and pride, to come back from being down 24-0 in the early third quarter to tie it late in the fourth. We just had some mistakes late.”

Haisch ran for 249 yards on 32 carries in the losing effort for the Bears. Evan Schmitt was 5-of-12 passing for 57 yards, with Sutton Ehlers catching two passes for 22 yards and Deagan Puppe hauling in a 17-yard pass.

Defensively, Ehlers led the team with 13 total tackles, Austin Hall added 10, Haisch had nine and Puppe had seven.

The 5-2 Bears close out the regular season with a matchup against Lutheran High Northeast Thursday in Norfolk.

The Bears look good for the D1 playoffs, but Lutheran Northeast will make the season finale a tough one.

LCC 0 0 8 16 — 24

Wakefield 12 6 6 6 — 30

WAK LAU

Rushing 43 - 318 47-257

Passing 1-2-55 5-12-59

Total yds 45-373 59-316

Fumbles-Lost 1 - 0 0 - 0

Turnovers 0 0

First Downs 15 16

PASSING

LCC - Evan Schmitt, 5-12-57.Wakefield - Justin Erb, 1-1-55.

RUSHING

LCC - Evan Haisch, 32-249. Nolan Ohlrich, 3-21; Sutton Ehlers, 3-8; Evan Schmitt, 9- -7. Wakefield, Logan Bokemper, 13-201; Justin Erb, 20-82; Blake Brown, 8-24; Cade Johnson, 2-11.

RECEIVING

LCC - Sutton Ehlers, 2-22; Deagan Puppe, 1-17; Jake Rath, 1-11;  Cael Hartung, 1-9; Wakefield - Nick Arenas, 1-55.

TACKLES  LCC -  Sutton Ehlers, 13; Austin Hall, 10; Evan Haisch, 9; Deagan Puppe, 7.  

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