Facing a double-digit halftime deficit, Franklin College could have gone quietly into that good southern Indiana afternoon and closed out its season with a second straight loss.
But the Grizzlies weren’t about to go out like that.
On the road against rival Hanover, Franklin stormed back to take the lead in the third quarter and then added an exclamation point in the fourth, reclaiming the Victory Bell with a 27-16 triumph on Saturday.
Stymied in the first half, the Grizzlies (5-4, 4-3 HCAC) pulled ahead when Kai Ross threw third-quarter touchdown passes of 17 yards to Dylan McKinney and 14 yards to Jarrett Gibson. The host Panthers (5-5, 4-3) struck back, pulling back in front at 16-14 on a TD pass of their own, but Derek Baldin’s 38-yard field goal with 1:12 to go in the period helped Franklin regain the lead for good.
A 28-yard kick by Carter Brown with 10:21 left in the fourth stretched the lead to four, and Ross and McKinney provided some more cushioning when they connected for an 87-yard score with 4:10 to go.
Ross totaled a career-high 264 yards passing on the day, with McKinney accounting for 163 of those on his five catches. Garrett Cora provided some offensive balance, rushing for 80 yards on 26 carries. Defensively, Jason Pigg paced the Grizzlies with 14 tackles, while Michael Heading added seven stops, including two behind the line of scrimmage. Franklin held a Hanover team averaging more than 200 yards rushing to just 70 yards on the ground.
It was the first Victory Bell win for everyone on the Grizzlies’ roster, with the exception of fifth-year seniors Evan Stambaugh and Noah Ryan. Hanover had claimed the last three series meetings after snapping a streak of 13 straight by the Grizzlies from 2005 to 2017.
