In any sport, rivalry games are intense. They are the games teams look forward to all year long. Fans are ready, players are ready, and it can be guaranteed to be a great game.

Of course, it’s even better with a win.

“Words can’t describe [the feeling] honestly,” senior quarterback Ian Trapp said. “To be able to pull through and come to J.C. and be able to get the Silver Trophy back just feels amazing.”

Thanks to an all-around team effort, Manhattan High (6-0) claimed the Silver Trophy with a 27-22 win over Junction City (5-1) Friday night.

Both teams scored on their first drives with long passing touchdowns. While Junction senior quarterback Ryan Henington threw a 34-yard touchdown to open the scoring, Trapp and Manhattan quickly responded with a 60-yard passing touchdown to senior Jonathon Taylor to even the game at seven apiece.

Passing-wise, Trapp would finish the game 3-9 for 69 yards and one touchdown. Henington completed two of nine passes for 65 yards, with one touchdown and one interception.

Even with their first scoring coming on a pass, the Indians would return to their bread and butter; running the football. MHS’ rushing attack was productive early on, something it would be grateful for later in the game.

“It saved us, honestly,” Trapp said. “We couldn’t get anything going in the second half, except for that last drive where we scored. If we hadn’t had that great production the first half, we wouldn’t have pulled it out.”

Trapp would finish the game with 171 yards rushing on 35 carries and two touchdowns. Seniors Iverson Robb and Tariq Gerald added 53 and 51 yards respectively, with Gerald scoring a touchdown.

Manhattan scored twice more on rushing touchdowns in the first half, including a 28-yard run from Gerald on the second play of the drive. As a result, MHS had the halftime lead, 21-10.

Manhattan fumbled the ball on its first drive of the half, and Junction marched down to the 13-yard line before Henington failed to accurately pitch the ball to his running back, leading to a turnover on downs.

“At times we were struggling to stop them,” head coach Joe Schartz said, “but [our] defense did pretty well cause [Junction has] a lot of weapons, and you know, we kept them out of the endzone just enough.”

Any hopes MHS had for keeping Junction City off the board in the second half were quickly dashed on J.C.’s next drive, as Henington ran 60 yards in two plays for a touchdown.

Neither team would score until midway through the fourth quarter, as both defenses dug deep and came up with big stops.

With around five minutes left, J.C. scored a touchdown to take a 22-21 lead. The MHS offense then took control of the ball at the 33-yard line, needing to go 67 yards to score a touchdown. The Indians got one quick first down, before running into a fourth down with seven yards to go. Trapp stepped back to pass, and threw it to Taylor. It bounced off his chest and rolled along a J.C. defender’s back before being caught by senior Parker Beer.

“I saw the ball there,” Beer said, “and it was fourth down, and I knew I was going to make a play. I wasn’t letting that ball hit the ground.”

Schartz said that was the biggest play of the game.

“It was huge,” Schartz said. “[If] we don’t convert there, [and] get the first down, game’s over basically. We had to convert.”

Manhattan continued to drive the ball, with Trapp running five straight plays to reach the end zone, and put MHS up 27-22, as the two-point conversion failed.

Manhattan’s defense went to work with 2:02 left in the game. It allowed two quick runs from Henington before creating its biggest play of the game.

Henington went back to pass, and threw to his receiver running down the right sideline. He threw it too far left, and put too much under it, leading to an interception by none other than Trapp, basically sealing the game for Manhattan.

“All week they’ve kind of been practicing me at just playing deep safety coverage so I could jump up make a play on the ball,” Trapp said, “knock it down, whatever, and they put me in to close the game out. [I] just stayed over the top, pretty simple assignment, and I was just glad I had the opportunity to make the play for the team.”

Even though the biggest game of the season is behind them, the Indians still have two more games to play. Next up for Manhattan is Emporia at home this Friday.

“Well for this week,” Beer said, “we got to focus on Emporia, and then we keep going game to game. There’s no let-up.”