By: J. Daniel Pearson for Positively Osceola
Given the history of the sport in the county, perhaps it is not surprising that Harmony – winners of the last four championships and nine of the last 12 – would be meeting arch-rival St. Cloud for the 2024 Orange Belt Conference flag football championship.
What is a little surprising was how close the Longhorns came to not even making it the championship. Francheska Moreno scored a second quarter touchdown and Kinzie James made a huge play at the goal line, as Harmony held on for a 7-6 win over upstart Celebration in the semifinals of the OBC Tournament on Tuesday night.
The Storm (4-1) now move on to play St. Cloud (4-1) at neutral site Osceola on Thursday night at 7 p.m. for the championship. The Lady Bulldogs advanced to the finals with a 24-7 win over the Kowboys in Tuesday’s other semifinal.
This game had a lot of moving parts,” Longhorns coach Paul Strauch said. “We were just a little out of synch on offense all night. Twice we had a chance to put the game away but failed to score from two yards out each time. Still, our defense played a great game and at the end of the day they won the game for us.”
After a slow start by both clubs with each team throwing an interception, Harmony would go on top midway through the second period on a 9-yard touchdown pass from Martha Edwards to Moreno. The tandem would also hook up on the conversion as the Longhorns would take a 7-0 lead.
With time running down, Celebration would drive the length of the field. Storm quarterback Leena Bolejack’s pass in the end zone was tipped away by James as Harmony clung to the one score lead at intermission.
Harmony would open the third quarter with a long drive down to Celebration 3, but on a fourth down play from the Celebration 10, Edwards misfired the Longhorns turned the ball over on downs. Bolejack would then direct a four-play 77-yard drive to cut the gap to 7-6. Nayala Rivera would cover the final 54-yards on a catch and run, but the conversion failed and Harmony clung to the 1-point lead.
The teams traded possessions and Harmony would take over with six minutes to go in the game. Edwards would lead them on a long 11-play drive but on fourth and goal from the three, Edwards was picked off for a fourth time, as Val Martinez took the interception, broke left and appeared headed for a potential game-winning score before she was run down at midfield.
From there, Bolejack completed three passes, took advantage of a pass interference penalty and then broke a short run. With time running out, the Storm called their final timeout with 10 seconds left and the ball resting on the Harmony 10-yard line. Bolejack completed a pass to the two to Rivera, who lateraled the ball back to Ella Kolaric. But before she could reach the goal line, James came up with the pull at the 1-yard line as the clock expired.
“That last interception was a little scary because it looked like she (Martinez) was going to take it to the house so that flag pull at midfield was huge. That play made them drive half the length of the field and fortunately they did not have enough time to get it in the end zone,” Strauch said. “Kinzie James made several big plays for us all night on defense, including that big pull at the goal line.”
Edwards finished the game 23 of 36 for 222 yards but had the four picks. James led the team with seven receptions for 76 yards. “Martha struggled a little but it wasn’t all on her,” Strauch said. Two of the interceptions came off deflections and she also had a wide open touchdown pass that was dropped.”
Bolejack finished 20 of 29 for 200 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions and also rushed for 49 yards on six carries. Rivera caught five passes for 95 yards and a score and also had an interception. Martinez had two interceptions for the Storm, who will play Osceola in the third place game at 5 p.m.
“While I don’t think we played our best, I don’t want to take anything away from Celebration,” Strauch added. “Ethan (Celebration coach Ethan Fournier) did a great job at tuning Liberty around last year and is now doing the same thing at Celebration.
2024 OBC Flag Football Championships
Quarterfinals (Monday)
Celebration 27, Liberty 0
Harmony 45, Tohpekaliga 0
St. Cloud 14m Gateway 0
Osceola 18, Poinciana 0
Semifinals (Tuesday)
Harmony 7, Celebration 6
St. Cloud 24, Osceola 7
Championship Round (Thursday at 6pm) at Osceola High
3rd Place Game: Celebration at Osceola
Championship: Harmony vs. St. Cloud
