Central Christian had their season come to a close with a loss to Victoria 36-22 on Friday in Hutchinson in the Eight-man Division 2 quarterfinals.
Defense dominated the first quarter as the teams turned the ball over on downs each of their first 3 possessions. It was not until over 4 minutes had passed before Central Christian scored as Luke Eigsti scooped up a Victoria fumble and sprinted 57 yards for the touchdown. After missing the two-point conversion, the Cougars led 6-0. Victoria answered with a 13-yard run by Wyatt Schmidtberger and 2-point conversion to take an 8-6 lead with 4:27 remaining in the half.
After CCS was unable to convert from the Victoria 11-yard line, Weston Sherrer broke free on the first play of the drive for the Knights, scoring on a 69-yard TD run. Victoria carried that 14-6 lead into halftime.
Victoria received the second-half kickoff, and again Sherrer broke a big run, scoring from 60 yards out. That was the only score of the third quarter as the Knights led 20-6. Then with 6:15 remaining in the game, Sherrer added his third TD on a 13-yard run. Matt Pfeifer added the 2-point conversion to give Victoria a 28-6 advantage.
But the Cougars fought back, getting a 4-yard TD pass from Eigsti to Piercen Huff and with Cal Barnett getting the conversion, Central Christian cut the lead. The Cougars almost recovered the onside kick, giving the ball back to Victoria. Again, it was Sherrer getting the touchdown, his fourth of the game, to give the Knights a 36-14 advantage with 2:27 remaining in the game.
Central Christian did not give up as they moved down the field quickly and scored on a Eigsti to Barnett pass covering 18 yards. Barnett added the two-point conversion to cut the score to 36-22.
Central Christian ended the game with 257 total yards of offense. Eigsti completed 20 of 37 passes for 204 yards and threw for two touchdowns. Huff was the leading receiver with 13 receptions for 133 yards and one touchdown.
Victoria improves to 10-0 and will host the semifinal game on the west side of the bracket against Hodgeman County. Central Christian finishes its season at 10-1.
