DRAPER—Manti foot- ball’s battle with Juan Diego last Friday night was nothing short of a fourth-quarter thrill ride, courtesy of sophomore quarterback Maison Starkweather.
Starkweather entered the game to replace injured senior Kayson Douglas midway through the third quarter
when the Templars were down by 22. He then led the team on an inspiring 20-0 run to make it a game, but his final pass for a game-tying conversion was batted down, and Manti went home with a loss, 34-32.
Coach Cole Meacham said the team came away from the loss excited by the late scoring run but disappointed that the comeback fell short. “We’re proud of them for battling,” Meacham said, “but we’ve got
to come prepared to play in the first (half ). We can’t just say we’re a second-half team. We’ve got to take care of busi- ness to start the game.”
Before going down, Doug- las completed 12 of 23 passes for 176 yards, one touchdown and one interception.
Starkweather completed 10 of 16 passes for 155 yards, two touchdowns and one intercep- tion. He also ran in a third touchdown, the one that set up
the final conversion attempt. Junior Reggie Frischknecht had a stellar night receiving, catching nine passes for 132 yards and two touchdowns. Senior Larsen Pogroszewski had four catches for 76 yards and a touchdown.
Facing an aggressive Juan Diego front seven that stacked the box often, the Templar offense couldn’t do much rushing the ball. Pogroszewski led the team with eight carries for 28 yards and a touchdown. Defensively, Manti struggled with the run-heavy offense of the Soaring Eagle, who relied on quick handoffs to get out of the backfield quickly so that the Templars couldn’t make plays on defense. Manti still managed two sacks.
The gameplan by Juan Diego kept the ball out of Manti’s hands and ate a lot of the clock as they build a strong 27-12 lead at halftime.
Coming out of the half, Juan Diego took their first drive all the way downfield and scored again while eating up seven minutes of the third quarter.
On the first play of Manti’s ensuing drive, Douglas stepped back to pass and was flattened by multiple blitzing linebackers, fumbling the ball and sustaining a concussion.
Juan Diego got possession inside the Manti 20-yard line and took a shot at the end zone immediately, but Pogroszewski had none of it, as he dove to secure an interception and a touchback.
Enter Starkweather, and the sophomore slowly drove the Templars across midfield before launching a pass for Pogroszewski who reeled it in and shed his defender position for a 50-yard touchdown as the third quarter drew to a close.
While Starkweather struggled to move the offense in the fourth quarter, Manti’s defense stepped up in a big way, keeping Juan Diego’s offense from moving anywhere as the game clock wound down.
With under two minutes remaining, Manti got the ball back, and Starkweather turned high-voltage. The sophomore took shot after shot against the Soaring Eagle secondary with tremendous success.
He capped off the drive with a highlight-reel play where he rolled out left, saw incoming pressure, then rolled out right and fired 40 yards to the end- zone into Frischknecht’s hands for a touchdown, a play that had CentraCom commentator Greg Sterner screaming with excitement into his headset.
Manti then opted for an onside kick, which they managed to recover and set up another possession 40 yards from the endzone. Starkweather took another shot at the endzone for Frischknecht who was impeded by his Juan Diego defender, who incurred a 15-yard penalty.
That put the offense in- side the 10, and Starkweather evaded multiple tacklers to take off from the pocket and run it in himself for a 9-yard touchdown.
On the ensuing conversion attempt, Starkweather tried a fade route to Frischknecht to the corner of the endzone, and Juan Diego committed pass interference again.
With a yard and a half to go, Starkweather evaded pressure and tried to hit junior Hunter Stevens just over the goal line, but the defense collapsed on Stevens just in time to bat it down and seal the win.
Manti moved to 2-2 on the season. Douglas will be in concussion protocol and will not be able to play again until symptoms have disappeared entirely.
The Templars will be on the road once again Friday to take on Morgan, the top-ranked 3A team in the state.
