On a night in which Owensboro Catholic celebrated the Class of 1972—which was the first team to beat the Red Devils in program history 50 years to the day—the Aces pulled off a 21-17 upset of Owensboro in tremendous fashion thanks to strong defense and a pair of late-game touchdowns from sophomore Vince Carrico.
The Red Devils defense helped them get off to a solid start, as a turnover on downs led to a string of runs by senior Kenyatta Carbon—with the latter being an 11-yard run to the endzone—that gave them a 7-0 lead with 4:38 left in the first quarter.
The game hit a bit of a stalemate after the score, as it wasn’t until the second quarter that Owensboro got going again. Senior Ethan Pendleton kickstarted the drive with a Randy Moss-esque catch over a double team for a 37-yard gain to put them in the redzone 11 seconds into the second quarter.
But Owensboro Catholic’s defense held strong, limiting the Red Devils to a 31-yard field goal by senior Andrew Lanz to make it a 10-0 game with 11:26 left in the first half. The Aces bounced back offensively though, getting a 23-yard touchdown reception from junior Kaiser Frick three minutes later and cutting their deficit to 10-7.
Owensboro took its lead into the locker room, but wasn’t able to turn things on offensively in the third. Owensboro Catholic started the second half with an onside kick, but weren’t able to score off of the big play.
However, following the game Head Coach Jay Fallin said the Aces onside kick recovery made it much more difficult for both teams to find the endzone in the second half.
“So that onside kick to start the second half even though they didn’t score there, that determined the field position for the entire third quarter and into the fourth quarter,” Fallin said. “Because neither team could really finish a series or a drive.”
Owensboro Catholic continued to stifle them on multiple drives, but wasn’t able to capitalize offensively—that was until the fourth quarter.
The Aces found themselves at the 15 to start the fourth, thanks to a big run from sophomore quarterback Brady Atwell. A few plays later, Vince Carrico bullied his way into the endzone from eight yards out to give Owensboro Catholic the go-ahead touchdown and a 14-10 lead with 10:44 left in the game.
The Aces crowd exploded with enthusiasm following the touchdown, but the Red Devils were giving it their best to not fall to them for the first time since 2018. Owensboro was able to convert on third and 12 with 9:12 left in the game to spark the offense, with Pendleton breaking out for a big gain a few plays later.
The Red Devils were faced with fourth and four with 7:33 left to play and after a timeout, senior quarterback Kasey Boone hit Kenyatta Carbon up the middle for a 23-yard catch to put them on the six. Two plays later Carbon found the endzone on a three-yard rushing touchdown, taking a 17-14 lead with 6:37 to play.
Owensboro Catholic eventually faced fourth and two on its ensuing drive and were unable to get it, putting Owensboro on the 43-yard line with 3:06 left down 17-14. But the Aces were able to lock in and make the big stops when they needed to, forcing a turnover on downs for the Red Devils with 1:49 to play.
Head Coach Jason Morris said that their aggressive mentality defensively was what made the difference for them on that end of the gridiron, helping them step up in the biggest moments under the Friday night lights.
“This may sound crazy, but we knew that Owensboro is more athletic than us, had better speed than us, bigger than us—but we weren’t going to play scared,” Morris said. “We played more man coverage and brought pressure at them more than we had seen anyone do. Even Daviess County, which brings lots of pressure. We pressured them all night long and got a lot of pressure on their quarterback and I think that made a big difference.”
Fallin noted that the Aces defensive scheme was unconventional and that the Carrico boys played big roles in stifling Owensboro’s offense, while penalties also hurt their progress downfield.
“They run a 3-3 stack and it’s sort of novel, you don’t see it a lot,” Fallin said. “Vince and Tutt are almost perfect for that particular style of defense they run. They did a really good job of coming downhill and frustrating us just enough. Then we had a lot of silly penalties that put us behind the sticks and put us in a position where they were doing a really good job of taking away what we wanted to try and do in the passing game. If you’re going to have to run the ball, which we did effectively throughout the course of the night, you cannot have penalties that push you behind the sticks.”
And while it was Tutt and Vince Carrico that were major factors defensively, Vince was able to come through once again on the night offensively when it mattered most. Sitting at the 41-yard line with just under two minutes to play and the clock ticking away, the Aces ran the ball a few times before Atwell aired one out downfield to junior Deuce Sims.
Despite missing on some earlier opportunities in the game, Sims glided through the air and came down with a massive 35-yard grab with tight coverage and got his feet in bounds. He put Owensboro Catholic at the six-yard line with just under 30 seconds on the clock, where they ran a play that Vince Carrico was more than ready for.
“I was just worried about making a play,” Carrico said. “I knew there was going to be a play to be made and I knew that I was going to be the one to make it… I ran a swing and I was like ‘I’m the third read on this, I might get the ball. If I do, I’m taking it to the crib.’”
And that Vince did, as he took the handoff and trucked two defenders on his way to the endzone to give the Aces a 21-17 lead after the PAT with 25.7 seconds to play. Morris was thrilled with Sims for making a big catch after missing some earlier opportunities, showing true fight and helping the offense’s ability to execute in the end.
“We went ahead and ran it a couple of times and then took a shot,” Morris said. “Deuce Sims made a great catch there… From there our staple play is mesh. From that point on they didn’t even have to look over to the sideline, they knew we were running mesh. We ran mesh three plays in a row and scored on the last one.”
Vince said that he and his teammates knew that they weren’t going to lose on Friday, saying that they were prepared for a four-quarter bloodbath and ready to compete. Morris tipped his cap to the two-way player after the game, saying that he had full confidence that he would come through when the ball was in his hands.
“Vince Carrico is the epitome of Owensboro Catholic football,” Morris said. “He’s a tough, hard-nosed, 4.0 student. If it’s Vince Carrico against somebody else for a chance to win, Vince Carrico is going to win.”
Owensboro was able to get off a few more plays, but none were able to help them find the endzone. With less than 10 seconds on the clock Boone rolled out to his left looking for one last chance to heave a hail mary, but he was sacked just before time expired and the Owensboro Catholic crowd erupted and students stormed the field.
Following the game Morris said it might sound crazy coming from a coach at a catholic school, but he choked up while sharing that the message for the team was derived from catholic virtues. He went on to say how proud he was of his team for staying true to the process all week and being loyal to each other, noting that if they got a chance to win in the fourth they felt confident in their chances.
“Honestly, we’ve been working a lot on what we call virtues equals strength,” Morris said. “Talking about the catholic virtues of just having faith. Our strength of the week was all about fidelity, which means being loyal. We could’ve easily been the opposite of loyal and just laid down after the last two weeks’ losses. We had our best week of practice, we stayed loyal to each other, to the program and when you do that and do things right the virtue does become your strength.”
Fallin shared the notion that the Aces fought hard for the win, giving credit to the coaching staff and the Red Devils city-county foe for not giving up when trailing early on.
“Gotta give a lot of credit to coach Morris and his staff,” Fallin said. “They did a great job. They had their kids ready to play. We went up 10-0, it would’ve been easy for them to fold and quit but they didn’t.”
The win moves Owensboro Catholic to 2-2 overall, as they have another big test ahead of them in Louisville Christian Academy on the road at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 16. Morris noted just how big the win was for them going into the test and just how much it can prepare them to maximize their potential as the district portion of the season approaches.
“This is huge for us,” Morris said. “Owensboro is a state-championship caliber football team and that tells us where we’re at… Last week we said that’s a regional finals type game, this week is a final four/state championship kind of game and so is next week with Louisville Christian Academy. So we’re getting that three weeks back-to-back just like you’re gonna get in the playoffs before district play starts. So we’re going to treat next week like a state championship before the state championship ever hits.”
Meanwhile, Owensboro falls to the Aces for the first time since 2018, now moving to 2-2 overall on the season. Following the loss Fallin made sure to tell his players that hard losses are part of the territory with the game of football, especially when it comes to community games like this one.
“I told the guys, if you play this game long enough you’re going to have some tough losses,” Fallin said. “Put yourself out there and play games and play games against rivals, sometimes things are going to go poorly. We’ve won 11 City-County games in a row and that streak comes to an end tonight. It’s always a war when we come over here. We knew it would be.”
The Red Devils were without key players in seniors Jermiah Goodwin and Kanye Johnson due to injury, but Fallin was far from making excuses after the game. Fallin further explained that they just fell short on the night and that this one will sting for awhile.
“Both of those guys, we don’t know their future right now,” Fallin said. “But we gotta take this for what it is… We’re hurting right now. This hurts. Even though it’s always competitive and always a battle, typically our community expects us to win this game and it’s a lot of pressure on our kids and our kids feel that pressure. We just didn’t get it done tonight. We didn’t make some plays that we needed to make throughout the course of the game to win the game.”
Fallin told his guys they can take the loss one of two ways. They can fall apart or they can learn from it and choose to get back to work, hoping to return to form as the latter half of the season approaches.
“We’ve got some soul searching to do,” Fallin said. “We came out first game of the season and played pretty well in defeat and since that time, I don’t think we’ve played well at all. Even in the two victories I didn’t feel like we played well. And now that it’s a trend, that’s on me to figure out what’s going on and why we’re not playing well. So we’re going to get back to work.”
As long as Owensboro can tune out the noise and focus on themselves going forward, the Red Devils can turn things around next week against Breckinridge County at 7 p.m. at home on Friday, Sept. 16 and take steps towards a strong finish to the season with district play approaching.
“We’ve gotta get back to the drawing board and learn,” Fallin said. “I told them it’s going to be a tough 48 hours, it’s going to be a tough week. We’re going to have to hear about this a lot, but we have to tune that out and keep those things on the peripheral and focus on what matters. Which is right now, we have to choose to get better.”
