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‘Cheesesteak’ makes Bullitt East a state champion for the first time in football history.

Cheesesteak made the difference in Bullitt East’s program-making victory at Kroger Field on Saturday night.

The Chargers defeated Male, 28-27, in the Class 6A UK HealthCare Sports Medicine State Football Finals in Lexington, winning their first state championship after two failed trips in 1994 and 2008.

The decisive play — a two-point conversion — was the Chargers’ take on the “Philly Special,” used by the NFL’s Eagles en route to a Super Bowl win over the New England Patriots in 2018.

“We called it ‘Cheesesteak,’” Bullitt East Coach Keegan Kendrick said.

Bullitt East, trailing 27-20, received the ball at the 20-yard line with 1:43 to play in regulation. It quickly covered the 80 yards, the bulk of it coming on a tough catch in the middle of the field by Camron Brogan. With 53 seconds left, it was Brogan who scored the touchdown — a wide-open 16-yarder delivered from Travis Egan — that forced a decision from the Chargers: attempt the extra point or go for broke.

“I asked the kids, ‘Do you wanna win it or do you wanna go to overtime?’” Kendrick said. “This is something we’ve had in the playbook for two or three weeks now. We practiced it actually before we came here just to make sure we had it in case we needed it, and I guess we needed it.”

They had some time to sure things up: Male called its final timeout to firm up its defense once Bullitt East showed it was trying a two-point conversion. There was no second-guessing by the Chargers during their timeout, and out of it came a sequence they’ll be talking about for the next century in Mount Washington: Egan lines up in shotgun; he hands the ball to Brogan, crossing left to right; Brogan, with a defender set to wallop him, thrusts the ball backward to Nolan Davenport, who’d lined up at receiver on the right; Davenport covers about 15 yards crossing the field before a left-handed toss to Egan, who by then was wide open near the front of the end zone.

“It’s a tough play to stop,” Kendrick said. “It’s given a lot of teams a lot of success, right in that exact same spot. Our guy Nolan Davenport has been begging me to allow him to throw the ball at some point this year. We actually tried it earlier in the year and we couldn’t quite get the execution.

“That was a pretty easy way to give him the ball, and people don’t usually account for the quarterback getting out in space.”

Bullitt East quarterback Travis Egan (10) ran into the end zone with the winning two-point conversion. On the trick play, Egan caught a pass from wide receiver Nolan Davenport in the final minute.
Bullitt East quarterback Travis Egan (10) ran into the end zone with the winning two-point conversion. On the trick play, Egan caught a pass from wide receiver Nolan Davenport in the final minute.
Bullitt East’s Travis Egan (10), Camron Brogan (2) and Nolan Davenport (20) celebrate after helping to execute the game-winning two-point conversion with 53 seconds left to play.
Bullitt East’s Travis Egan (10), Camron Brogan (2) and Nolan Davenport (20) celebrate after helping to execute the game-winning two-point conversion with 53 seconds left to play.

Male’s last chance

Male (10-5) had 53 seconds to put together a drive, and a kicker, Lance Gossett, who nailed two earlier field-goal attempts, including a 37-yarder.

A string of completions to the outside got the Bulldogs to the Bullitt East 45-yard line with about 20 seconds to play. Their hopes of a game-winning try by Gossett ended when quarterback Lucas Cobler was brought down in bounds as he attempted to scramble to the sideline.

Male head coach Chris Wolfe didn’t harbor regret about using his final timeout prior to the two-point attempt, but did have concerns about another late-game decision. On the Bulldogs’ prior offensive possession, they had fourth-and-3 from the Chargers’ 8-yard line. His gut told him to go for it, but his defensive assistants talked him into a field-goal try. The kick was good by Gossett, making the score 27-20.

Wolfe was concerned that, without two defensive backs who were injured earlier in the contest, the Bulldogs would struggle to stop Bullitt East from tying or going ahead in the final minute.

“We got to seven, and seven’s only good enough if you can stop ’em,” Wolfe said.

Male, in the Class 6A finals for the fifth straight year, lost its fourth straight.

Moving mountains

Things looked dire for Bullitt East (14-1) at the onset.

Male built a 14-0 lead less than a minute after kickoff, scoring on a 74-yard catch-and-run by Max Gainey and a 16-yard fumble recovery by Korrey “Scoop” Mattingly.

It took awhile for the Chargers to answer — they didn’t score till there was 6:16 left in the first half, on a 73-yard bomb from Egan to Brogan — but they tied the game before the half on a pass from Egan to running back Mason Gauthier.

Male regained the lead and extended it to 24-14 ahead of the fourth quarter. Davenport caught a TD pass from Egan early in the final period to pull the Chargers within 24-20, but the PAT failed.

Their momentous finish made them the second school from outside the city of Louisville — joining Scott County (2013) — to win a Class 6A championship since the division was established in 2007. Bullitt East and Scott County are the only schools from outside Louisville to have won the state’s largest classification going all the way back to 1996, when Nelson County edged Paul Laurence Dunbar for the Class 4A championship.

A massive crowd of Bullitt East supporters turned out at Kroger Field on Saturday to cheer the Chargers on to their first state championship.
A massive crowd of Bullitt East supporters turned out at Kroger Field on Saturday to cheer the Chargers on to their first state championship.
Bullitt East players posed with their trophy after winning the school’s first state championship in football.
Bullitt East players posed with their trophy after winning the school’s first state championship in football.

Bullitt East made history before a crowd of 9,331 fans, at least 80 percent of them wearing their colors.

“Our community has bought in so much to what we’ve asked ’em to do,” Kendrick said. “ … Just to see how many people we had here today? Our community deserved this and needed it. I’m excited that our kids were the ones that were able to give that to them.”

Egan, who was named MVP, comes from a long line of Chargers. His grandfather, Mike, coached the program from 1985 to 2001. His dad, Brandon, quarterbacked the program under granddad. Egan wears the same number, 10, that his father wore. Said Egan:

“It really feels like we moved a mountain doing this.”

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