This was the game Whiteland had waited a year for, and this was the end result they had craved the entire time.
Seething about last season’s sectional semifinal loss to New Palestine, the Warriors dined on a buffet of revenge served cold Friday night, running past the defending Class 5A state champion Dragons, 48-13, to secure their first sectional championship since 2014.
Beginning today, fourth-ranked Whiteland (9-1) is focused on a regional tilt with No. 1 Cathedral next week. But Friday was all about returning the favor to the Dragons, who had tacked on a couple of gratuitous touchdowns late for a 35-7 win on the Warriors’ home field last November.
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“It was payback,” Warrior senior linebacker Kayden Welling said. “We had our backups in last year, just giving the seniors a last chance, and they wanted to run it up and try to be selfish, so this year we gave them a dose of their own medicine.”
“Last year’s game provided some motivation for this team,” coach Darrin Fisher added. “They took last year’s result to heart and handled it the right way, and knew that we had to have a little more to finish — and I think that showed tonight. What they had in their tank to finish this game tonight was what we were looking for all offseason and what we worked for all offseason.”
Whiteland set the tone immediately by forcing the Dragons to go three and out on their opening possession, then marching 48 yards in nine plays for its first touchdown, a 4-yard quarterback keeper by Brant Kunz. New Palestine then turned the ball over on downs at the Warrior 38-yard line, and it took the home side just two plays to cash in — a 22-yard run by Chase Valentine followed by a 40-yard scoring sweep by Jonathan Crowley.
Jakarrey Oliver then forced a Dragon fumble on the ensuing kickoff, and Valentine scored six plays later on a 3-yard run to put the Warriors up 21-0 with 11:11 to go in the half. Whiteland appeared poised to add to that lead before the intermission, but it fumbled the ball away near the goal line midway through the second quarter and then came up short on a 49-yard field goal try as time expired.
New Palestine (8-2), which stormed back from a 27-3 deficit in the last 14:44 to squeak past Franklin last week, had no such second-half miracles in store this time. Whiteland opened the third with a methodical 13-play, 62-yard touchdown drive that was aided by a roughing-the-punter penalty on the Dragons and finished off by a 4-yard Valentine run.
Two plays from scrimmage later, New Pal quarterback Logan Roth lofted a pass that found the waiting arms of Welling, who took the interception 45 yards to the house to stretch the margin to 34-0 with 5:03 left in the period.
“I just saw the ball come in my hands and I knew one of their fast guys was behind me,” Welling said, “so I knew I’d better start running so I don’t get made fun of at practice tomorrow.”
Roth broke up the shutout late in the third with a 4-yard scoring run, but his opposite number answered back by tossing a pair of touchdown passes. On the first play of the fourth, Kunz went over the top to Dalton DeBaun for a 49-yard scoring bomb, and he followed up by finding Max Sullivan in the end zone from 7 yards out with 6:45 to go, starting up a running clock on a Dragons team that came in with a 96-5 record under coach Kyle Ralph.
The Warriors didn’t even feel a little bit bad about rubbing it in.
“We were trying to make them feel how we felt (last year), and that’s what we did,” senior offensive lineman Ethan Myers said.
Roth found Blake Austin for a window-dressing TD pass with 2:16 left, but that did nothing to dampen the Whiteland celebration.
The payback party will only last for a few hours before the Warriors turn their attention to the top-ranked Fighting Irish, who hammered Decatur Central 42-7 in their sectional title game.
Though Whiteland will go into that game as a significant underdog, it won’t go in scared at all.
“We all know this some of our last chances to play football, and we all do it for each other,” Welling said. “We’ve all grown up, rough times, and we’re all willing to fight for each other and we’re not willing to back down to anybody. We played New Pal close last year; we’ll play Cathedral and we’ll win (next) week.”
