INLAND FIELDHOUSE

CORONA – What impressed me most about the Liberty-Centennial varsity football game on Friday, Sept. 22, 2023, was the Huskies insistence that Cornell Hatcher is better than you are.

Traveling all the way from Peoria, Ariz., for this matchup, Liberty’s sideline was rightly hyped after taking lead after lead in the first half. The Lions were big and strong and unafraid. But Centennial was faster to the edges and on the outside, and it made just enough of a difference to move the chains and keep Hatcher grinding away at the linebackers, busting DBs in the mouth and finding the end zone again and again, including the game-winning TD.

Colin Thomas: “We wanted to have a dog fight and we got one. Obviously, it was a game where we had chances in the second half and a chance late and we weren’t good enough on a couple of those things. I knew if they got the ball back that it’d be tough to stop them. I think we’ve seen some good teams but I don’t think we’ve seen that level of team speed. There’s a definitely an adjustment there. Offensively, at time, we did some really good things. We just had to punch it in one more time and we didn’t do it. They’re a great team. Hats off to them. That’s why they’re the program they are, and hopefully we’ll learn from this and get better. When we do what we do at a high level we think we can move the ball and score on anybody. Again, they’re a really good time and credit to them for finding a way to win.”

Matt Logan: “Not a million-dollar performance, that’s for dang sure. The lights were great, but the turnovers again are plaguing us and putting us in bad positions. But the good thing is we were able to overcome them. We were negative five (turnovers) and had a 2-percent chance of winning so we can’t continue to do that and expect to win. We’ve worked really hard on that and will continue to work on it. Obviously, we need to change some things up because it’s not working. We’ve got to be smarter and better. (Hatcher) is such a work horse. He’s such a phenomenal player and a great kid and great citizen. Every little bit of success he has you’re happy for it because he’s truly worked for in every capacity that you can as a teenage high school student. He’s incredible on the field. He’s incredible off the field. He’s a leader and he is what he is, and he was just phenomenal tonight.”

Liberty – 14 – 7 – 7 – 7 — 35
Centennial – 7 – 14 – 0 – 21 — 42
First quarter
L – Bruson 32 run (Hawkins kick), 2:32
C – Hatcher 68 run (Junger kick), 1:27
L – Wilson 1 run (Hawkins kick), 0:06
Second quarter
C – Butler 14 pass from Longstreet (Junger kick), 9:51
L – Wilson 5 run (Hawkins kick), 5:15
C – Zamora pass from Longstreet (Junger kick), 0:18
Third quarter
L – Wilson 6 run (Hawkins kick), 7:14
Fourth quarter
L – Wilson 36 pass from Bruson (Hawkins kick), 11:52
C – Hatcher 7 run (Junger kick), 11:00
C – Hatcher 1 run (kick failed), 10:28
C – Hatcher 13 run (Westbrook pass from Longstreet), 0:31
Team statistics
Total plays – Liberty 85; Centennial 89.
First downs – Liberty 22; Centennial 24.
Penalties – Liberty 7-70; Centennial 14-155.
Turnovers – Liberty 2; Centennial 5.
Individual statistics
Rushing – Liberty: Bruson 19-105, Wilson 17-104, McKivitz 1-8; Centennial: Hatcher 30-289, Longstreet 14-109, Butler 1-8, Roby 1-3.
Passing – Liberty: Bruson 23-34-1-268, Fletcher 0-1-0-0; Centennial: Longstreet 23-34-3-325.
Receiving – Liberty: McKivitz 7-91, B.Gardner 5-61, Wilson 4-57, Wolfer 3-41, Wadlington 2-16, J.Gardner 1-7, Pilegaard 1-6, Jezioro 1-3, Watson 1-(minus-3); Centennial: Butler 7-118, Harris 6-76, Fuentes 1-40, Westbrook 2-35, Zamora 2-29, LaRocco 3-20, George 1-9.
Interceptions – Liberty: Dalton 1-32, Knapp 1-3, Romero 1-0; Centennial: Granger 1-0.