Quarterback Bryce Cooper had himself a second half on Friday night for the Dexter High School football team, propelling his Tiger team to a thrilling 38-34 win at Orono High School.
The visiting Tigers were down 14-8 at halftime in the 8-man small school playoff game. That’s when Cooper took over with a punishing, relentless running attack from behind center. Cooper had four touchdowns on the ground in the second half alone.
“I’m a senior. I thought this could be my last game, so I’m going to fight my hardest to get in the endzone every time I can, and get every extra yard I can,” Cooper said.
Each time that the Orono Red Riots battled back to keep the game in reach, Cooper was there to slam the door shut.
“Coming in here, we knew they were definitely going to be a good team,” Cooper said after the win over the Red Riots. “We weren’t going to go down without a fight. We had to execute our gameplan, and that we did.”
He tied the game at 14-14 with a short goal line touchdown, then he somehow escaped what looked like a definite sack on the two-point conversion to scamper in for a 16-14 lead.
Orono retook the lead on a 30-yard touchdown run by Felix Khalil, and went up 22-16 after a two-point conversion.
But Cooper answered with a spinning 40-yard run to quickly take the Tigers to the Orono 24. The Dexter quarterback then kept it for an 11-yard touchdown scamper a few plays later to tie it at 22. A subsequent two-point conversion run by Kody Kimball put Dexter back up 24-22. The Tigers would never trail again.
The Dexter playcaller then added a 13-yard touchdown run on the Tigers’ next possession, putting the visitors up 32-22 with just over 11 minutes left in the ballgame.
The Red Red riots kept up with Dexter’s pace, however, as Orono senior Kason Bagley added a critical 19-yard touchdown run to make it 32-28 after slashing through the Tiger’s defense.
Dexter’s Kimball then made an equally huge stop on the two-point conversion to keep it a four point game.
Faced with a pivotal fourth and two on the next possession, Dexter once again turned to Cooper. And once again, he delivered to secure a new set of downs.
Not long after, the Dexter quarterback broke for another long run, this time for 38 yards and his fourth touchdown of the half.
Orono junior Richie Watson refused to let the Red Riots fade, however, converting on a fourth and four moment of desperation and turning it into an electric touchdown from midfield. Watson took an option pitch from Bagley and went all the way for the touchdown. Orono remained behind by four points, by a score of 38-34, after missing the two-point conversion.
And who did Dexter turn to in order to finally close out the thrilling playoff matchup? You guessed it.
Cooper kept the ball in his hands on a crucial fourth and two play with just over a minute left. He got the needed yards, and Dexter got the win.
The Tigers avenged a close loss to the Red Riots in the regular season, and now get to take on the formidable cooperative team from Stearns of Millinocket and Schenck of East Millinocket. That Stearns/Schenck team won the 8-man small school North region title a year ago, and beat Bucksport handily on Friday night.
Dexter coach Andrew Levensalor said he has a “ton of respect” for the Orono team.
“We knew coming in it was going to be the game of the week,” Levensalor said, calling the Red Riots a tough, well-coached and disciplined group. “But it feels good. We say at the end of the day, someone’s going to win and someone’s going to lose, and today we came up on top.”
