[Stardust]

The Conner football team has played in numerous close games this season in which its offense often had to bail out the defense to rally for a victory, but on Friday night it was the defense that made a couple of fourth quarter plays to help the Cougars hold on for a win.

The biggest one came when Conner held Covington Catholic running back Luke Bir just inches short of the goal line on a two-point conversion attempt with 3:23 remaining in the game and the Cougars proceeded to run out the clock for a 13-12 win at rain-soaked and muddy Fred Nevel Stadium in Hebron.

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The end of the first half featured a fight in which three Covington Catholic players and one Conner player were ejected. The Kentucky High School Athletic Association usually suspends ejected players two games meaning those ejected won’t be eligible until the state quarterfinal round of the playoffs.

Even though the game was between two teams not in the same classification level (CovCath is Class 4A and Conner is Class 5A) the win helped Conner (8-2) break a three-way tie for first in its district and earn a home first-round playoff game as the No. 1 seed. Conner entered the night tied with Cooper and South Oldham for first in the district, but the three-way tie is broken by virtue of taking any four victories that don’t include wins over the teams in the tiebreaker and earning a point for each win those four beaten foes earned. CovCath entered the night with seven victories.

CovCath (7-3), which is ranked No. 3 in the Associated Press Class 4A state poll, rallied from a 13-0 halftime deficit to pull within 13-12 when Luke Bir capped a 33-yard drive by rushing the final four yards for a touchdown. The TD was setup by a 44-yard punt return by Ethan Egbers.

After sure-footed kicker Adam Goddard, who was 10 for 10 on extra-points in a game earlier this season, missed badly on an extra-point attempt on CovCath’s first touchdown of the game due in large part to the sloppy field conditions, CovCath coach Dave Wirth opted to attempt the two-point conversion, but Luke Bir was stacked up by at least half the Conner defense just inches from the goal line. Bir never went down and after the officials blew the play dead it took almost 30 seconds to make the official signal that he didn’t cross the goal line.

“We knew the way the rain was coming down and the way the field was going to be that it was going to come down to defense,” said Conner junior quarterback Drew Barker, who rushed for 105 yards and a touchdown on 23 carries and completed 4 of 7 passes for 35 yards. “Before the game we had a meeting and talked about how the defense was going to have to step up and they did. It was their best defensive effort all year.”

Conner, which is ranked No. 6 in the AP Class 5A state poll, entered the game allowing 27.1 points per game and had allowed seven of their first nine opponents to score at least 21 points.

The Cougars held the potent CovCath offense, which was averaging 408.0 yards and 42.0 points per game, to just 243 yards total offense.

“Our guys know how to win,” said Conner coach Dave Trosper, whose team has rallied four times for wins after trailing in the fourth quarter of games. “We’ve lived through injuries to our defense and we’ve lived through everything you could ever imagine within our program and that’s just made us stronger. Our guys don’t listen to all that stuff about how the defense can’t do this and can’t do that. We got over injury bug and got some guys back and we’re getting better.”

One key player Conner got back was three-way threat Cameron Fogle, who missed the last two games and over two weeks of practice due to a foot injury. Fogle finished with 88 yards rushing on 11 carries, including runs of 22 and 17 yards on the final drive that killed the clock, the latter on a reverse on a 3rd-and -11 play for the clinching first down. He also had two receptions for 21 yards and a fourth-quarter interception.

“He’s Mr. Everything to our team,” said Barker. “He had that interception; he got key first downs and just was huge.”

Said Trosper: “He hasn’t practiced in 15 days and we limited his reps in practice this week, but he’s a football player. He loves the game. He lives it, he eats and he breathes it. He comes to school and he comes to football and he stays as long as I do. We have a lot of guys like that.”

Covington Catholic 0 0 6 6 -- 12
Conner 7 6 0 0 -- 13

C-Barker 7 run (Dunaway kick)
C-Fogle 26 run (kick failed)
CCH-Braun 18 pass from B. Bir (kick failed)
CCH-L. Bir 4 run (run failed)

Records: Covington Catholic 7-3, Conner 8-2.http://preps.cincinnati.com/nky