Cherry Creek dominates Valor Christian to send Bruins to seventh straight Class 5A title game

GREENWOOD VILLAGE — The Bruins are, once again, inevitable.

Cherry Creek dominated Valor Christian on Saturday in the Class 5A semifinal at the Stutler Bowl, 42-17. That sent coach Dave Logan’s squad to its seventh straight title game as the Bruins seek to get back on top after falling in last year’s championship to Columbine.

“That loss to Columbine made us really hungry,” junior running back Jayden Fox said. “We’re not finished yet. All season long, as we’ve won (12 in a row), we’re always looking at the opponent in front of us. And now there’s only one left.”

Saturday’s game was never close as the Bruins dominated in all facets. Fox and Junior quarterback Brady Vodicka paced the offense while the Cherry Creek defense had a pair of takeaways that helped the Bruins pull away early.

“I thought we put together four good quarters,” Dave Logan said. “The kids executed the plan. Valor’s an excellent team. But I just thought we played really good football today.”

Logan called the Bruins’ run of consecutive state title games “immaterial” to the team’s goal next weekend.

“What’s important is we celebrate this, and then tomorrow as a staff we’ll get back to work,” Logan said.

Fox’s 2-yard TD run put Cherry Creek up 7-0 late in the first quarter. Then an interception by Bruins senior safety Dwight Johnson, who sat down in coverage and read Dawson Olk’s pass, set Cherry Creek up in the red zone and led to Vodicka’s 23-yard touchdown run a few plays later to make it 14-0 in the waning seconds of the first.

The Bruins defense had another highlight midway through the second quarter when senior linebacker Ashton Shepardson picked off a screen pass and ran it back 25 yards for a TD to extend the lead to 21-0.

“I was planning on attacking the quarterback on that play, but I felt somebody behind me and I hesitated,” Shepardson said. “I jumped up, grabbed it and made a move on a guy to my right and it was wide open to the end zone.”

Valor Christian (11-2) then used an interception by senior safety Israel Waitman off a failed trick play to set up a scoring drive that culminated in do-everything junior Cash Spence’s 1-yard TD run out of the wildcat. That put the Eagles on the board at 21-7 with less than five minutes until half.

But Cherry Creek had a response via Alijah Landrum-Hamilton’s 17-yd TD reception with 28 seconds left in the half. Even though the Eagles were able to muster a 45-yard field goal from senior Mason Walters at the halftime buzzer, Cherry Creek went into the locker room in command, 28-10.

The Bruins got the ball to open the third quarter and marched down the field on a time-consuming drive that took 5 minutes, 11 seconds, and was polished off by Fox’s 5-yard TD run to push the score to 35-10. Fox finished with 148 yards on 16 carries with two TDs.

“I thought if we could get a stop to open the second half, after getting a little momentum back with the field goal, we could get back in the game,” Valor Christian head coach Bret McGatlin said. “But they put together a long drive to start the third quarter. That took the wind out of our sails.”

By the time Cherry Creek went on another clock-killing scoring drive that ate up 6:37 and was capped by freshman Elijah Cromwell’s 5-yard TD run, the Valor Christian fan section was thinning. Cromwell made it 42-10 with 9:42 left, and about seven minutes later, Olk threw a late TD pass to sophomore Jackson Coleman.

The Eagles were unable to establish a run game at any point, as they finished with only 56 yards on the ground.

“We wanted to take the air out of them in the second half,” Shepardson said. “Foot-to-throat, suck all the hope out of them and end the game as fast as we could.”

Saturday marked the 12th overall meeting between the two Colorado powerhouses since they first met in 2014.