Staff photo / Greg Macafee Canfield quarterback Broc Lowry (12) leaves a trio of Holy Name defenders in his wake en route to a 50-yard touchdown run during the Cardinals’ 38-21 win in the Division III state semifinals. Canfield will play for a state championship for the second time in program history next week.

EUCLID — In arguably the biggest game of his career, Canfield quarterback Broc Lowry showed what he was truly capable of.

The Indiana University-bound quarterback rushed 18 times for 228 yards and four touchdowns while leading the Canfield Cardinals past Holy Name, 38-21, to secure a spot in the Division III state championship next Friday at Canton’s Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium.

The Cardinals (13-1) will play Bloom-Carroll at 3 p.m. in their first state title game appearance since 2005.

“Broc is Broc, and that’s all we tell him to do,” Canfield coach Mike Pavlansky said about Lowry, who also threw for 117 yards. “We just tell him to be Broc, and that’s going to be good enough for us. But, he’s also going to be the first one to tell you that there are 10 other guys doing their jobs, but he’s definitely special.”

After receiving the kickoff to start the game, the Cardinals got off on the right foot. After two big plays to get their drive going, Lowry erased a penalty after taking the ensuing carry, his first of the game, 50 yards to the house to put the Cardinals on the board.

After Holy Name (11-3) methodically stitched a drive together to put seven on the board with a short Jayvon Williams run, Canfield answered right back.

This time around, Canfield marched down the field until Lowry found another open gap and broke through the line of scrimmage for a 24-yard touchdown run to put the Cardinals ahead.

“I just saw plays breaking down, and I was reading my linemen’s blocks and just following behind them,” Lowry said. “We had a lot of momentum coming into tonight, and I think we all had a big game tonight. So it was that preparation during the week of practice. We had a great week of practice, and it showed out during the game.”

Going into the matchup, Pavlansky said the Cardinals needed to key in on the Green Wave’s primary ball carriers in quarterback Jayvon Williams and running back Kriztion Sanchez.

Both had over 1,000 yards rushing going into Friday’s matchup. But, after that first drive, the Cardinals were able to bottle both runners up and steal the momentum.

As a team, the Green Wave finished with 135 yards rushing and scored 21 points, 14 of which came in the second half, after scoring just over 30 points a game throughout the season.

“We got used to the speed as the game went along, four (Sanchez) is a load and he was running through us but as the game went along we got better,” Pavlansky said.

Arguably two of Canfield’s biggest stops came in the second quarter.

With just less than nine minutes left in the half, a bad Holy Name snap on third and 8 led to a fourth and 17 in Canfield territory. After the Cardinals got the ball back on a punt, Lowry scored his third touchdown on the very next play with a 75-yard dash to the house.

On the ensuing drive, the Green Wave marched down to the Canfield 20-yard line and faced a fourth and 10 after a false start penalty. The Cardinals forced an incomplete pass on the next play, and they were marching again.

Shortly after an 18-yard run by Danny Inglis, the Cardinals were back in the red zone and with 13 seconds left in the half, Lowry punched it in from one yard out for his fourth touchdown of the game.

“The second quarter was huge. We didn’t allow the big play in the second quarter, and we tried to force them to go the field,” Pavlansky said. “We were able to make a couple of stops.”

Joel Miasek tacked on a 32-yard field goal in the third quarter, and Inglis capped off the scoring in the fourth when he found paydirt from one yard out on another big drive from the Cardinals to cap off the game.

Over the past three years, Lowry has led the Cardinals to some pretty big wins, but Friday’s was arguably his biggest and now he and his team are heading to the state final.

“It’s a great feeling for us and this community,” Lowry said. “We have a whole community and support system behind us, and we’re just happy to show out for them.”

gmacafee@tribtoday.com