Cherry Creek football starts state title defense with win over Doherty

COLORADO SPRINGS – The glaring silver of the turf at Garry Berry Stadium radiated a new feeling as football season kicked off in Colorado.

Doherty was the first team to host a game at the facility that Colorado Springs District 11 revamped over the summer. It wasn’t the ideal opening for the Spartans as two-time defending Class 5A state champion Cherry Creek rolled into town, starting its mission for a rare third straight title.

The CHSAANow.com No. 2 Bruins hit hard and hit fast, getting a 42-0 win to open the year.

“We’ve played Doherty a lot the last few years and those kids are tough and come to play,” Cherry Creek coach Dave Logan said. “You get a barometer when you play a team and I’ve been on the other side of that. You learn what you have to do to get better and you learn where things are.

This game also served a very meaningful purpose for Doherty. The program has struggled the last few seasons but has gotten its younger players more settled into their roles. To kick off the 2021 season, there was perhaps no better way to measure the team than to play a team like Creek.

Doherty might have a way to go, but the season is young, and every challenge must have a beginning.

“We have to be us,” Spartans coach Dwight Hale said. “We’re measuring success on us being us every game we play. The quarterback has to throw the ball, the line has to block, our receivers have to catch the ball. We’re measuring success not on wins and losses but on being us on every play that we can and we lost today in that aspect.”
 

The first play of the game had so much potential as Doherty quarterback Kaden Becker fired a quick pass to JJ Felix on a slant, but the ball just slipped through the receiver’s hands. There was nothing between Felix and the end zone except for Garry Berry’s brand-new turf.

The Bruins (1-0 overall) took control from there. They sacked Becker to set up a short field on their first possession, which ended with a one-yard touchdown run from Christian Hammond. They added touchdown runs from Keegan Holles and Carlson Tann and recovered a bad snap on a punt for a touchdown as well.

With the game all but out of reaching heading into the second half, Hale and his team put together a plan to make sure the team didn’t leave without getting better on this day.

The focus turned to getting the defense off the field and generating enough offense to move the sticks.

The Spartans (0-1) forced Creek to punt on the first possession of the second half which was a big victory after the struggles to get off the field in the first 24 minutes of the game. They even forced and recovered a pair of fumbles in the second half, showing that the defense has the ability to create turnovers.

From here, the team will just work to take the lessons they learned from the opener and apply them to the remainder of the schedule this fall.

“We try to focus on getting better each drive and really each play,” senior Keaston Bazzy said. “If you mess up then you mess up and move forward. Everyone makes mistakes in life and this is just football. We have to move past it.”

Doherty is back home Thursday night to welcome ThunderRidge to Garry Berry.