Tri-Valley used some of their own magic against Barberton who went undefeated for the last two regular seasons, and pushed forward for a place in the regional semi-finals with a 10 – 0 victory.
The Scotties fought hard but so did the Magics, both defensive teams held the respective offense from the end zone with battle after battle turning into punt after punt.
Coming into the game Tri-Valley had just tied Sheridan for their 8th straight Muskingum Valley League title, losing only one game in an upset against John Glenn High School on week 8. The Scotties were also ranked 7 in their division coming into the quarterfinal matchup.
Barberton was the favored team coming into the battle with a third place state Division II – region 7 ranking and a 10 – 0 regular season status which gained them their second straight Suburban League Championship.
Both offensive teams fought hard, but out of Tri-Valley’s 264 total offensive yards and Barberton’s 393 yards respectively they could not get through the massively effective defensive lineup of their opposing team. Tri-Valley was able to get kicker #46 Kaden Bay close enough to capitalize on a 31-yard field goal in the second quarter of play putting the Scotties on the board at 3-0.
Shortly after Bay’s successful kick the Scotties got their second score when #3 defensive back Cade Sterling grabbed a ball out of the air intended for a Barberton receiver and then continued to blast by tacklers for an extremely exciting touchdown just before halftime bringing the showdown to 10-0 Scotties. However, this would prove to be Tri-Valley’s final scoring session of the evening, but the damage was done and Barberton was not able to breach the Scotties defenses to bring in any score of their own.
With that the final score of the evening was Tri-Valley 10 – Barberton 0. A very big upset for the DAWGs and a chance to continue on against another Suburban League Team (Wadsworth) on Friday, November 9th at Dover Ohio’s Crater Stadium at 7pm. We look forward to seeing the Scotties in fighting form!!
