Niwot wears down, falls to Loveland – Cougars unable to hold 7-point lead in 2nd half

By Cheng Sio For the Ledger

LONGMONT — Through the first two-and-a-half quarters, Niwot senior linebacker Tyler Strong and his defense were as pumped and excited as the roaring Niwot crowd thanks to his interception and two big tackles that helped stopped scoring drives.

With less than three minutes left in the game, however, Strong and the Cougars` defense looked tired and defeated as they slowly trudged to the line of scrimmage attempting to block an extra-point.

Niwot`s spirit was zapped thanks to one Connor Medbery. The Loveland junior fullback scored three touchdowns in the final 15 minutes, 47 seconds as the Cougars fell 21-13 in Class 4A Northern League action Thursday.

“I don`t know what happened,” Strong said. “I came into the locker room yelling, ‘Keep it up, keep it up.` It just didn`t seem to stick to them, I guess. We just had a couple of rough plays that got us down and we just couldn`t bring it back.”

The toughest play of all occurred when Medbery delivered a big blow to break a 7-7 tie.

On the first play of a new drive, Medberry took a handoff, broke a few tackles running off left tackle, cut back to his right at the 15-yard line and scampered the rest of the way to the end zone for a 35-yard touchdown to give Loveland a 14-7 lead with 8:47 remaining in the game.

The Cougars then went three-and-out on offense and Medbery completed the finishing touches later when he rammed in a 4-yard score with 2:32 to play.

The culprit for Niwot`s demise was easily its lack of depth.

In the first half, Niwot accumulated twice as many first downs (12-6) and outgained Loveland 146-120 in total yards. Quarterback Brady Oleszczuk`s 1-yard sneak with 8:23 left in the second quarter opened the scoring.

But in the second half, Niwot wore down and the tables were flipped. Loveland amassed 224 total yards to Niwot`s 95. Eighty-one of the 95 yards came on the last play of the game when Oleszczuk`s pass was tipped near midfield and nabbed in midair by Kelton Manzanares, who ran it in the rest of the way for a touchdown.

“We have all the guys we need,” Manzanares said. “We have some guys going both ways but it`s all there.”

Unfortunately, head coach Ron Tesone said this loss has been the norm this season.

“We really fought hard against a pretty good football team,” Tesone said. “I think we just kind of wore down, kind of the same M.O. for this year.”

Loveland 21, Niwot 13

LV NHS

First downs 14 13

Rushing yardage 263 117

Passing yardage 81 124

Passing 6-15-1 5-15-0

Total offensive yardage 344 241

Punting 4-39 5-27

Fumbles-fumbles lost 0-0 2-1

Penalty yardage 7-67 5-53

SCORING SUMMARY

Score by quarters:

Loveland 0 0 7 14 — 21

Niwot 0 7 0 6 — 13

Niwot — Brady Oleszczuk 1 run (Chris Johnson kick)

Loveland — Connor Medbery 13 run (Logan Jones kick)

Loveland — Medbery 35 run (Jones kick)

Loveland — Medbery 4 run (Jones kick)

Niwot — Oleszczuk 81 pass to Kelton Manzanares (pass failed)

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING — Loveland: Medbery 17-146, Eberle 14-41, Weissmann 6-58, Lucas 4-11, Klein 2-6, Lawrence 1-1; Niwot: Manzanares 24-106, Oleszczuk 10-6, Strong 3-5, Sigafoos 1-0, Perry 1-0.

PASSING — Loveland: Weissmann 6-14-1, 81 yards. Eberle 0-1-0, 0 yards; Niwot: Oleszczuk 5-15-0, 124 yards.

RECEIVING — Loveland: Klein 3-48, Jones 2-30, Lichtfus 1-3; Niwot: Nichols 3-39, Manzanares 1-81, Strong 1-4.