From Deseret News archives:
5A high school football playoffs: Offense rests, but Skyline picks up huge win over Lancers in slugfest
Skyline waited until the final five seconds before the Eagles landed the knockout blow, a one-yard touchdown run by quarterback Kevin Wagstaff, to seal the 7-0 victory.
After being held scoreless by Layton to that point, Skyline mounted one final drive to earn the victory. Starting at its own 15-yard line with a little over four minutes to play, Skyline went to work.
A quarterback keeper down the right sideline by Wagstaff yielded 34 yards. Skyline then turned to its three-headed running back attack — muscle back Tupou Hautau and speed runners Brian Orr and Caleb Latteier — who gashed the Layton defense and set the Eagles up with first-and-goal at the Lancers' two-yard line.
With less than a minute to play, Skyline ran two plays right up the gut that were stopped just shy of the goal line. Facing a third-and-goal with only 8 seconds remaining, Skyline coach Roger Dupaix decided to go for it instead of kicking the field goal. Seeing that Layton's line was stacking the middle, Skyline ran Wagstaff off left tackle, where he broke one tackle and plunged into the end zone, where he was smothered by his euphoric teammates.
"We saw that they were stacked up the middle, so we decided to go left; it felt great to finally score," said Wagstaff.
Layton's defense, which had held up nicely throughout the game, had finally succumbed to the pressure of the huge Skyline offensive line pounding them all night.
Keeping the powerful Layton offense off the scoreboard was a powerful Skyline defense. Led by huge defensive lineman Will Vea, Devin Filipe and Tenny Palepoi, Skyline put incredible pressure on Layton quarterback Camren Applegate, knocking him around and refusing to give him enough time to find his receivers downfield. Skyline held Layton to 10 first downs all game and never let the Lancers get close enough to attempt a field goal.
Dupaix was elated to get the victory and gave great praise to his defense.
"I'm so proud of our defense; those kids kept us in the game all night," he said.
