MOUNT WASHINGTON – A week after rolling over one county rival with a strong final three quarters, the Bullitt East Chargers did the same on Friday, struggling early before shifting into high gear and blitzing visiting Bullitt Central 55-0.
The victory secured a fifth straight Bullitt Cup title for the Chargers. Bullitt East has not lost a game to either of its two county rivals since a 60-59 overtime loss to North Bullitt in 2020.
After the game, the Chargers accepted the traveling trophy that has not been doing a lot of traveling recently. The post-game ceremony was conducted by Tim Gonterman, representing Schmid Funeral Home. The Bullitt Cup is also sponsored by The Awards Center, The Pioneer News, as well as the Sweat and Griffee Law Office.
Most in the large crowd, which needed overflow parking on a beautiful night, knew that this season that Bullitt East was the better team. However, the Chargers again struggled early in the game. Through the first three games of the season, the red and gold trailed in each game in the first quarter. It should have been four weeks in a row as Bullitt Central had a golden early scoring opportunity that they let get away.
Over its first three possessions of the game, the Chargers ran 13 plays. On 12 of those plays the red and gold managed just 11 yards. The only positive play was a 39-yard run by senior running back Cole Fackler, but Bullitt East turned the ball over four plays later on downs. The first three drives ended with a pair of punts and a sack of the quarterback on fourth down.
After that first punt, Bullitt Central had the ball at its own 19-yard line and moved as deep as the Bullitt East four-yard line. While quarterback A.J. Lee did complete a pair of 12-yard passes to Rylan Morris in the drive, the main fuel came from Bullitt East penalties. The Chargers had a pair of personal foul calls, a late hit and a roughing the passer call. The Bullitt East defense did make a stop, sacking Lee on second down and then knocking down a pass. Bullitt Central head coach Tyler Faucett opted to try the field goal, but the Chargers’ Brady Weihe, who actually holds for his own team’s kickers, broke through and deflected Tripp O’Brien’s attempt.
It was not until the final minute of the first quarter that the Chargers put all of the pieces together. Following two more penalties, Bullitt East finally moved forward when Cole Cornell found wide receiver Evan Butler open for a 17-yard gain. On the very next play, Cornell connected with B.J. Jewell for 33 yards. Cornell then covered the final two yards with 15 seconds remaining in the quarter.
That first score opened the flood gates for the Chargers. The red and gold added a touchdown on each possession for the rest of the game. That was eight straight scores including one from the defense.
Three of those touchdowns came on passes from Cornell to Butler. The first of those connections came on the second score of the night on a six-yard pass. In the third quarter Butler hauled in a nine-yard pass from Cornell and on the next series Butler got behind the Cougar defense and hauled in a 29-yard touchdown pass.
The last of those three scores pushed the margin to 41-0 with 4:40 remaining in the third quarter and started the running clock for the rest of the game.
Butler finished the game with five receptions for 64 yards.
Before the game, Butler was not thinking about a perfect final score.
“I did not think like that,” he said on the field after the game. “As a team we just wanted to compete with them like we do every year.”
The player was as not worried about the early difficulties.
“No sir. I knew we would come back offensively after the first few drives,” the senior said. “It was like last week (when the Chargers trailed North Bullitt 6-0 after one quarter). I knew we would come back.”
Bullitt East head coach Keegan Kendrick knows that the starts have not been as strong as the team will need against tougher foes later in the season.
“Our starts are something we have to won on,” the coach said. “I was pleased our defense got started quick. We had them in bad field position and then made some stands.
“The slowness of the offensive start was that we felt we had to get the passing game going,” Kendrick pointed out. “We have been run heavy the past few weeks. Once the quarterback and the receivers got together it was good to see them make plays.”
The coach was not happy with the early penalties. He had called a timeout four minutes into the game after the first three of the four ‘major’ penalties in Bullitt Central’s opening drive.
“That is what I am most disappointed in. The silly penalties,” Kendrick admitted. “There is a lot of emotion in a rivalry game. We have to know how to channel that aggression into great plays before the whistle. We better figure it out fast, before the rest of the games.”
Bullitt Central had had trouble scoring when they get inside the ‘red zone’ this season. In the first game of the season, Faucett had bypassed an early field goal attempt, but the fourth down play failed to gather a score.
“We played well on defense in the first quarter,” Faucett said after the team’s return to Shepherdsville. “We got the stop and put a decent drive together and they had the penalties. Then the field goal was blocked.
“I have shied away from field goals at times this year in favor of trying for touchdowns,” the coach admitted. “We have been improving our blocking in the kicking game the past few weeks, but didn’t make the play there.”
Faucett knew that his team would need a perfect game to even stay close. That just did not happen.
“We played hard the entire game,” the coach pointed out. “Bullitt East is just a really good football team.”
An early score may not have changed the outcome, but it would have made the game more interesting.
“A 3-0 lead won’t change the outcome, but it would have kept our energy higher,” Faucett said.
Bullitt East pretty much uses a two-platoon system with no overlap between players on the offense and defense. More than half of Bullitt Central’s starters play on both sides of the ball all of the time.
“Coach Jackson had a good defensive plan early,” Faucett said. “Then depth became a problem again. We got tired and did not tackle as well. We had guys in the right spots, but we did not make the tackle.”
Bullitt Central was also severely limited when its one-back offense was without starter Kyler Crenshaw. He battled sickness all week. Crenshaw did attend school on Friday in an attempt to play, but it was a late afternoon decision that he would not play in the game. The senior, who played at Bullitt East as a freshman, had accounted for 58 percent of the team’s rushing yardage in the first three games and had all four of the team’s rushing touchdowns.
The first Bullitt East score came on Cornell’s short run and then in the second quarter, the red and gold added a six-yard pass from Cornell to Butler and then closed out the half with Cornell connecting with Christian Martinez on an 11-yard scoring pass.
Bullitt East’s first play from scrimmage in the second half was a seven-yard touchdown run by Fackler that was set up by a 38-yard punt return by Wiehe. Later in the third-quarter there were the two scoring passes from Cornell to Butler that covered nine- and 29-yards. In the fourth quarter, Garrett Stickdorn, who had started the game against Franklin County when Cornell had a sprained ankle, went around the right side for a 92-yard touchdown.
The final points of the game came from the defense. Bullitt Central’s back-up quarterback was hit hard by Aiden Huber. The ball went up in the air and was grabbed by Raiden Rios who ran it in from 35-yards out.
Bullitt East sophomore Landon Roby, who has become the team’s punter, filled in for fellow soccer team member Easton Hughes to kick the extra points in this game. Hughes was out with a minor injury.
Next Games: It will be homecoming in Mount Washington this week as the Chargers take on Louisville Central. Normally one of the top Class 3-A teams in the area, the Yellowjackets scored just six points in the first three games of this season before blasting Shawnee 49-0 on Friday to move to 2-2 on the season.
The Chargers and Yellowjackets have split the last two meetings with each team winning at home.
Game time at Bullitt East on Friday is set for 7:30 p.m. with the homecoming crowning planned for before the game.
Bullitt Central will make another short road trip this week, this time to Dixie Highway to battle Holy Cross. This will be only the second meeting since the turn of the century for the two maroon and gray Cougar teams to meet. Bullitt Central won a 2018 meeting 7-0.
The Louisville Cougars have started the season 3-1 and are coming off a 43-28 victory over Jeffersontown, a team the Shepherdsville Cougars will play in two weeks.
Game time at Holy Cross on Friday is set for 7 p.m.