SPARTANS’ TYLER SNELL NAMED MVP IN SOUTH’S DRAMATIC 38-26 TRIUMPH
LEXINGTON — Ultimately, it had to be the South Warren High School offense.
Sure, the defense had done its part. Special teams, always. But this time, in this setting, with these stakes, it seemed to make sense that the South Warren offense finally closed the book on Frederick Douglass High School on Saturday evening in the KHSAA Class 5A state championship game at the University of Kentucky’s Kroger Field.
South Warren’s Caden Veltkamp hit teammate Tyler Snell for the play of the game, a 49-yard touchdown strike with 2:09 left in the game, and the Spartans’ Luke Burton closed the book on the Broncos once and for all in the final moments, scoring on a 20-yard run that lifted South to a pulsating 38-26 victory over Frederick Douglass on the Kentucky Wildcats’ home turf.
This time, it was South Warren, which finished its season with a sparkling 14-1 record, that would be taking home the hardware. It was the third KHSAA state championship, and second in four years, that the Spartans have won under the guidance of veteran coach Brandon Smith.
And the school’s only been open for 11 years.
“Our motto, all year, was go out there and earn it,” South Warren offensive tackle Preston Parks said as he walked off the field in triumph. “We went out there and earned it.”
Snell, a sinewy 180-pound South Warren senior, was named the game’s Most Valuable Player, although it easily could have gone to his teammate, the 6-foot-5, 215-pound Veltkamp, who towers over most opponents and now, the rest of the Class 5A ranks in the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
Veltkamp, who plans to sign with his hometown school, Western Kentucky University, later this month, ignited the Spartans’ fast start with a deft passing touch and provided his typical hard-nosed leadership to finish the task at hand. Veltkamp, a three-year starter at South, completed 19 of 24 passes for 295 yards and three touchdowns. Burton and South Warren teammate Kobe Martin punched out the tough yards on the ground, and the Spartans’ defense made its share of critical plays, too.
It was South’s world, and everybody else just seemed to be livin’ in it.
“What about that … That’s a heckuva game,” Brandon Smith said in the postgame press conference. “That’s what it’s all about. But this game came down to guys making plays. I couldn’t be more proud of them.”
FDHS coach Frederick McPeek said the Spartans’ ability to control the clock — South Warren finished with better than a 2-to-1 advantage in time of possession — proved to be too much for the Broncos to overcome.
“Credit to South Warren, they’re a very good team,” McPeek said. “They got in some unbalanced (line) sets and ran the ball really hard. I’m really proud of our team. These guys, our senior class, they’re really done a good job establishing a foundation (at Frederick Douglass, which opened in 2017) … It didn’t go our way, today, but that doesn’t take away from what our team, our senior class, was able to accomplish this year.”
Frederick Douglass finished its season with a 13-2 record.
Veltkamp did most of his damage in the first half, completing 13 of 17 passes for 241 yards and two scores. FDHS running back T.J. Horton put his team in front, 6-3, on a 9-yard touchdown run with 4:15 left in the first quarter, but Veltkamp needed just six plays to take the Spartans 80 yards for their first touchdown, Veltkamp’s 49-yard touchdown pass to Luke Burton.
The Broncos’ secondary took the bait on Veltkamp’s play-action fake and Burton beat the FDHS defense on a deep post pattern to give South Warren a 10-6 lead.
It was a lead the Spartans would not relinquish.
“This is all we’ve worked for, since 2018,” Veltkamp said.
That’s when South Warren subdued Covington Catholic 20-16 for the KHSAA Class 5A title, when Veltkamp, Snell, standout defensive tackle Jake Jackson and Burton were freshman on the SWHS campus, finding their way around while Gavin Spurrier and the Spartans’ varsity were kicking tail and taking names.
South Warren teammates Mason Willingham and Preston Parks were freshmen that year, too, and in fact, the bulk of the Spartans’ senior class has played together since they were in knee pants, for a youth football team called the “Rebels” that usually played in mini-tournaments in Bowling Green, Elizabethtown and Owensboro.
Now, these guys can embrace the time of their lives long after they graduate from South Warren High School next spring.
“It’s been a brotherhood, basically, our whole life,” Willingham said as he filed out of the locker room and toward the team buses.
Veltkamp got exceptional protection on his second touchdown pass, but he waited an extra split-second and took a shot as he found Snell on the post pattern for a 22-yard touchdown pass with 4:38 left in the first half.
Moments later, FDHS quarterback Samuel Cornett, who is headed to the University of Louisville as a preferred walk-on player, got the ball to Dane Key on a 73-yard scoring pass. The Broncos opted for a 2-point conversion, which the Spartans stopped with their typical gang-tackling effort, and South Warren still led 17-12.
That score held until halftime, and in the third quarter, South Warren’s special teams twice snuffed out attempts at a fake punt as the Broncos scrambled to get back in the game.
Martin’s 16-yard run through the teeth of the FDHS defense set the stage for another dramatic score, Burton’s 1-yard touchdown run on a fourth-and-1 play with 5:38 left in the third quarter.
“They had the (defensive) box stacked up all the time,” Martin said. “Caden had to check off from run to pass, and pass to run, all the time. We really just decided to make a statement when the time came.”
Cornett’s 5-yard touchdown pass to Dane Key again got the Broncos within five points, 24-19, with 7:01 left in the game, but Veltkamp and the Spartans offense answered the bell again.
The Spartans covered 80 yards in just eight plays before Snell’s second touchdown, a 31-yard scoring play in which Veltkamp initially fumbled the snap from South’s Zack Goodwin before finding his balance and hitting Snell in the middle of the field, just short of the goal line.
“I knew it was going to be a touchdown before (Goodwin) even snapped the ball,” Veltkamp said. “I just had to pick up the ball … Tyler was right there to make the catch.”
That was the way it went, most of the night, one South player bailing out another. Under the gun, when things were going well … it didn’t seem to matter.
This was South Warren’s night, any way you sliced it.
“We went out there, and finished the job,” South Warren wide receiver/defensive back Avril Bell said. “This was everything we had worked for, starting in January, after losing to Bowling Green (41-24) in the playoffs last year … We had to have the discipline, the focus, to strive for greatness.
“Yeah, it’s pretty cool. It is.”
