High School Football: Historic Toledo season unravels in second half of State championship
Cheese Town Blues – Early Riverhawks lead turns sour in 47-34 loss to Tri-Cities Prep
Jordan Nailon for Blast Zone Media / blastzonenews@gmail.com
Prep Football / Report
HUSKY STADIUM – It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
Toledo had already paid its penance to the football gods nearly 30 years ago, suffering a blowout loss in the program’s only other state championship appearance. So when the Riverhawks entered the 2B title tilt undefeated and ranked No. 1 in the state, everyone from the old mayor in his overalls to members of that 1996 State runner-up team showed up to the gridiron on Montlake with visions of the gold trophy dancing in their heads.
And when Toledo raced out to a 14-0 in the first quarter, everyone in black and red began to feel a certain way. Not that they said it out loud. They just made eyes at one another – saying the thing that everyone was thinking while still leaving it unspoken.
The Toledo Riverhawks were going to be the State champions, and the town’s decades old wounds were set to be healed.
Except they weren’t.
Instead, an unimaginable second half collapse left Toledo holding the little trophy once again after a 47-34 loss to Tri-Cities Prep, Saturday, at Husky Stadium.
And instead of a parade all the way from Seattle to South Lewis County, the day ended with head coach Mike Christensen standing in front of the Toledo fans in the grandest of stands to say two things: Thank you, and I’m sorry.
Christensen, who was a member of the 1996 Toledo team that lost 70-0 to Royal, knows all too well the heartache that comes with a loss in the championship game. And if losing in a blowout in the title tilt was bad, losing a game your team seemed destined to win somehow felt even worse.
“You want it so bad. You want it for your kids and you want it for the town. Everyone that you grew up with and you idolized and then you don’t have the success. You don’t do it. You don’t accomplish it. It hurts. Obviously somebody wins and somebody loses, but you push and you push and you push and you want that storybook ending and it doesn’t happen sometimes. It’s hard. It’s tough. You just feel like you let everybody down.”
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