Highlands QB Hoge makes 'SportsCenter'

It was a good week for Highlands' senior quarterback Beau Hoge.

Last Sunday, the dual-threat signal caller committed to continue his football career in college at Brigham Young University.

Highlands head coach Brian Weinrich said Hoge, who has thrown for 3,048 yards and 32 touchdowns with only six interceptions while also running for a team-high 654 yards with 20 more scores, will only continue to improve in college because of his dedication to getting better.

"They're getting a guy who is committed to the team," Weinrich said. "Ever since I've known him in middle school, he's been committed in all areas. Academically, he's put himself in position for colleges to want him, and then he's put himself in position socially by making good decisions and staying out of trouble. Physically, other guys go home and watch football and play video games, and he goes home and does a core workout. I think they're getting a tremendous competitor without a doubt."

Friday night, Hoge capped the week by leading his Bluebirds to a 37-34 win over CovCath to capture another 4A regional title. Hoge rushed for 177 yards and three touchdowns, and threw for 191 yards and two more scores while completing 14-of-22 passes in the victory. But that wasn't even the best part.

Hoge's 81-yard touchdown run in the third quarter that put the Bluebirds ahead 37-14 at the time was one of the most impressive runs you will see at any level of football – the play kids grow up dreaming about putting on a highlight tape one day. It also ended up being the game-winning points, as CovCath made a furious comeback in the fourth quarter.

To top it all off, Hoge's run was the No. 1 overall play on ESPN's "SportsCenter" Top 10 plays of the day for Friday. Hoge's father, Merril, is an analyst for the network.

The play was a designed run to the right, but Hoge typically has the green light from the coaching staff to read the play and option out of it based on how the back side of the defense reacts. With the time and score, Weinrich expected Hoge to run the called play on this occasion.

"At first I was thinking, 'What's he doing?,'" Weinrich said. "The play was designed to go the opposite direction and the ball was supposed to go to the running back. He has the freedom on a lot of plays if it's there to take it, but at that point it just wasn't a play I thought he was going to keep."

Hoge faked the handoff to junior Nick Kendall, who was running towards the right in the same direction his offensive line was blocking, but then pulled it and kept it himself when he saw the Colonels' defensive end bite too hard on the "give" to his running back.

Hoge made his first defender miss about 10 yards into the run when he hit a second gear and ran up the left sideline past the diving defensive back. Ten yards later, he was forced to juke back towards the middle of the field to avoid a defender waiting for him, but that also sent him into a crowd of four converging Colonels. After making the initial defender miss, he stopped on a dime and sent the other three flying past with the same back-step juke move two times in a row.

As he reached midfield, Hoge squeezed through a tight gap in the defense and reversed fields, cutting back from the numbers near the left sideline to the big blue H logo in the middle of David Cecil Memorial Stadium and turning up field again. He slowed up one more time as he crossed over into CovCath territory at the 45 to make one more defender fall with his most impressive juke of the run, and then turned on the accelerator to sprint past the final wave of CovCath defenders.

"Once he was running down the field, it was one of those plays you joke about as a coach where you're like, 'Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god … OK, great play.'" Weinrich said. "I had actually looked down at my play sheet several times during the run, because I thought multiple times, 'OK, for sure he's going down here.'"

He ran into the end zone with an escort of five Bluebird blockers following closely behind him nearly 20 seconds after he had snapped the ball.

"I had no idea what was going on until I saw the film," Weinrich said. "It was amazing."