High School Football: Trotwood-Madison clinches 3-0 start with late pick vs. Springfield

“I told my linebacker I was going to grab the middle,” Dennis said, “because last year they beat us on a slant like that, and I was not going to make the same mistake.”

“It’s amazing,” Dennis said. “We’ve got to keep working.”

Credit: David Jablonski

Credit: David Jablonski

“I hope these kids understand where they are as far as the work they’ve been doing,” Trotwood coach Jeff Graham said, “and hopefully they’re not complacent. That’s the biggest thing that I’m trying to focus on with them. Hey, we haven’t really established a complete overall game. It’s been defense, defense, defense. The offense made a good drive last week. Defense, of course, made a great stop here. We’ve just got to keep you know, plugging away and understand that you know, defense wins championships, and our offense has got to methodically move the ball and not make turnovers.”

“We asked them to play for 48 minutes, and they did,” Douglass said. “We just happened to be on the wrong side of the stick. We both made plays when we needed to make them. They just made one play more.”

Springfield is one of four winless Greater Western Ohio Conference teams. Centerville, Fairmont and Northmont are also 0-3. Only Springboro (2-1) is over .500. All eight GWOC teams lost in Week 3.

This time, Springfield took possession at its own 36-yard line with 1:39 to play. Four straight completions by CJ Wallace gave Springfield a first down at the Trotwood 5-yard line with 29 seconds to play. That’s where the drive stalled with two straight incompletions and the interception.

Trotwood won despite “a lot of mistakes,” Graham said.

Credit: David Jablonski

Credit: David Jablonski

“I think we played very sloppy,” he said. “I think that was the way that we practiced during the week, and now I’m hoping that these guys understand that the way you practice during the week will dictate how you play on Friday. It’s like a dress rehearsal.”

Trotwood led from start to finish. After a slow start by both offenses, Trotwood took an 8-0 lead on a 74-yard touchdown pass from Dallas Shehee to Tristen Bozeman and then a 2-point conversion with 2:01 left in the first half.

Springfield answered fast with a 9-yard touchdown pass from Wallace to Deontre Long with 1:23 to play in the half. The Wildcats trailed 8-7 at halftime.

Neither team scored in the third quarter. Trotwood lost two fumbles, but Springfield couldn’t capitalize.

Then Shehee threw a 20-yard touchdown pass to Bozeman early in the fourth. Shehee added a 2-point conversion run to give the Rams a 16-7 lead.

With 5:32 remaining, Wallace scored on a 1-yard run. The extra-point attempt was blocked, and the Wildcats trailed 16-13.

Trotwood scored on the two conversions because its kicker suffered an injury last week against Fairmont.

“Hopefully, he’ll be back this week,” Graham said. “We’ve been practicing a couple guys but didn’t want to put them in that kind of situation.”