High school football: Late, 6-minute drive lifts Silverwolves past Cougars

KEARNS — In a key game to determine playoff position, neither Riverton nor host Kearns would go down for the count — even when it seemed like the knockout blow had been delivered.

But the Silverwolves answered the final bell when Daniel Hoffman took a sweep 8 yards for the game-winning touchdown with less than three minutes to play as Riverton defeated the Cougars 26-21 in football action Wednesday night to take sole possession of second place in Region 3.

Hoffman's score capped off a 13-play, 84-yard, six-minute drive by Riverton after Kearns had taken its first lead of the game at 21-20. Eight of the drive's plays saw the ball going to Silverwolves running back Zach Spencer, who finished with 99 yards. And on the last play, most of the crowd thought Spencer had the ball again, as he and quarterback Davis Johnson sold the play fake brilliantly. But Hoffman took it in for the score.

"Truly it was the kids," said Riverton coach Mike Miller of his team's win. "That last drive, any call you made would have worked because the kids just kept making it happen."

Riverton (6-3, 3-1 Region 3) took a 7-0 first-quarter lead when Johnson hit Hoffman on a 5-yard slant in the end zone.

The Cougars went a long way to respond on a drive that started at their own 9-yard line. On another trick play, Kearns quarterback J.R. Finai faked a handoff to Toa Afatasi, kept it and took off for 71 yards to the Silverwolves' 4-yard line. Finai finished the drive with a 1-yard keeper to tie it 7-7.

After Spencer gave Riverton the lead again on a 6-yard run. Kearns mounted another march down to the Silverwolves' 2-yard line. But on first-and-goal, the Cougars' Alamoti Vaenuku was hit and fumbled, and Riverton's Tone Rich scooped up the ball and ran 98 yards the other way for a 20-7 lead.

That big play didn't deflate the Cougars. They marched back with a third-quarter drive, kept alive by a third-down pass interference penalty on Riverton and finished with a 25-yard touchdown run by Afatasi.

Later in the third, Kearns' Dominic Cagle wrestled away a pass from Riverton's Tad Carter. Kearns (5-4, 2-2 Region 3) took it down to the 12, and on fourth-and-5, Finai rolled out and found a seam to take it in for his second touchdown of the game. He finished with 93 yards rushing.