CRESTON — Jacob Bruner and his Norwayne teammates weren’t ready to relinquish the throne.

Bruner threw for 134 yards and a touchdown and the Bobcats won their second straight Wayne County Athletic League championship with a 24-17 win over Hillsdale on Friday.

Norwayne (8-2, 7-0) has won 11 consecutive meetings between the WCAL heavyweights. Hillsdale’s last win in the series was in 2014.

Friday’s loss was perhaps the most bitter of all.

“That one hurts because there were opportunities to win the football game and we just didn’t capitalize in the first half,” Hillsdale coach Trevor Cline said. “There were too many plays in the first half that we missed out on and in a championship game, if you want to be a champion, you’ve got to seize the moment.”

Hilldale (9-1 overall, 6-1 in the WCAL) got on the board first when A.J. Brown booted a 38-yard field goal with 9:18 remaining in the first quarter.

Norwayne answered immediately when junior running back Chaz Maxwell busted loose for a 44-yard touchdown with 4:25 to play in the opening period.

The Bobcats made it 14-3 early in the second on Cam Hackworth’s 1-yard plunge. The Falcons answered when quarterback Kael Lewis scored on a 1-yard keeper to make it 14-9 with 2:12 to play in the opening half. 

That set the stage for what turned out to be the most important drive of the evening. Bruner marched the Bobcats the length of the field and tossed a 2-yard TD pass to Cade Leach with just eight seconds to play in the second quarter for a 21-9 lead.

“Coming out of the gate we knew it was going to be a battle,” said Bruner, who has thrown for 1,872 yards and 17 touchdowns this season. “We had guys step up on both sides of the ball.”

Fantastic Finish

After a scoreless third quarter, Hillsdale reached into its bag of tricks to cut the deficit to 21-17 early in the fourth.

Running back Owen Sloan took a pitch from quarterback Kael Lewis and ran to his right. Just as a pair of Norwayne defenders closed in, Sloan tossed an awkward pass to Hayden McFadden, who caught it near the goal line and tumbled into the end zone for a 4-yard touchdown.

Norwayne pushed it to 24-17 when Carter Miller’s 32-yard field goal snuck over the crossbar with 5:37 to play. 

Hillsdale regained possession and began to march, but a controversial interception by Miller on a pass intended for Kyle Turk gave the Bobcats possession on their own side of midfield.

Norwayne collected a couple of first downs to run out the clock and secure the 10th WCAL title in program history and ninth since 2008.

“Before the last drive I talked to the line and said, ‘We’ve been fighting for this all year,’ ” Bruner said. “Since Week 1 we knew this was going to be a battle.

“Winning the conference championship means everything to us.”

Postseason

Both Hillsdale and Norwayne will play in the postseason and both will have opening-round byes after finishing in the top four in their regions.

The Falcons are the No. 1 seed in Region 27 of Division VII, while the Bobcats will finish either third or fourth in Region 18 of Division V.

“There’s still plenty for us to play for,” Cline said. “We wanted to win a league title, but we came up a little short.

“We want to win a regional championship and play for the state championship again, but we’ve got to get some things cleaned up first.”