1A football semifinals: No. 1 Limon, No. 6 Wray to meet in title game
By Brad Cochi/CHSAANow.com
Photo: Lance Wendt/wendt5280.com
The Class 1A football state semifinals were all played on Saturday afternoon throughout Colorado.
When the dust settled, the championship game competitors for next week’s title game were set. No. 1 Limon will face No. 6 Wray in the state championship game next Saturday at the CSU-Pueblo Thunderbowl.
(1) Limon 41, (13) Colorado Springs Christian 0
The Limon football program is the all-time leader with 20 state titles and is seemingly back in the championship game every single year. That hasn’t changed in 2022.
In the Class 1A state quarterfinals on Saturday, the unbeaten and top-seeded Badgers won 41-0 over No. 13 Colorado Springs Christian School. In victory, the Badgers earned the chance to play for yet another state title. It was also the program’s 700th victory. Next week, it’ll be title No. 21 they’re after.
Despite the Badgers’ historic resume, they’ll have their hands full against No. 6 Wray in the championship game. The Badgers’ game with Wray on Oct. 8 during the regular season, a 13-8 win for Limon, was by far their closest contest of the season.
“They’re just tough and physical football players,” Limon coach Mike O’Dwyer said on the Coloradopreps.com Scoreboard Show. “When we played over a month, month and a half ago, it was really we had one more play than they did. So, it’s really just a pick ’em game and it’s really hard to beat a good team twice. We’re going to have our work cut out for us.”
The Badgers entered Saturday’s game having allowed an average of just 12.1 points per game to their previous opponents. Their defense was stout yet again on Saturday, and the Badgers led 35-0 at halftime.
Prior to finishing runner-up to Centauri in last year’s championship game, the Limon football team had won three in row from 2018-20.
Saturday’s loss marked the end of an impressive postseason run for Colorado Springs Christian School. The Lions had upset their way to the semifinals, beating No. 4 Buena Vista by three points in the first round and coming from behind to beat No. 5 Yuma in the second round.
(6) Wray 28, (2) Strasburg 0
The Wray football was not messing around on Saturday.
In the Class 1A state semifinals, the No. 6 Wray Eagles faced No. 2 Strasburg, a team that had only one loss on the season and that came against heavy title favorite Limon. That impressive resume, however, did little to deter the Eagles (9-3) from coming out on the attack right from the beginning to build an early lead and holding on for the 28-0 victory.
For Wray to upset the No. 2 seed in the semifinals wasn’t a massive surprise to many, as the team has battled injuries all season. But to do it by shutting out a high-scoring team like Strasburg was a stunning turn of events to say the least.
“It was just a good, phyical playoff game between two really good teams,” Wray coach Levi Kramer said on the Coloradopreps.com Scoreboard show. “We started off playing extremely phyical again and they gave us some short fields, which we needed against a very good, physical Strasburg team.”
With a spot in the state championship game in hand for the first time since 2010, the Eagles have a chance to win their first football championship since 1993.
The Wray defense was outstanding, pitching a first-half shutout against a Strasburg team that had averaged 43.5 points per game up to that point. The Eagles led 21-0 at halftime.
Had Strasburg reached the state championship, it would have been the team’s sixth title-game appears in the last seven seasons.
