East Liverpool’s D’Shawn Kirby (80) flips West Holmes quarterback Morgan Smith on Friday. (Special to the Journal/Jimmy Joe Savage)

EAST LIVERPOOL — East Liverpool’s football team overcame a 1-4 start and found itself as the first team in Ohio history to host a second-round playoff game as a 12th seed.

The good vibes that filled the second half of the season came to a close on Friday as the Potters bowed to 13th seed Millersburg West Holmes 24-13 in a Div. IV, Region 15 second round game on Friday at Patterson Field.

Outside of the 2020 COVID playoff year, it was the first time East Liverpool (7-5) advanced to the second round since 2002.

“It was a great stepping stone for our program and it’s disappointing that we lost,” East Liverpool coach Paul Cusick said. “It hurts but for only having these seniors for two years, we’re going in the right direction.”

West Holmes (8-5) has at least made it to the regional semifinal the last five seasons. The Knights will take on top-seed St. Clairsville (12-0) next Friday at a neutral site to be determined on Sunday.

“We play a really tough conference schedule,” first-year coach Keaton Leppla said. “We play up every week, we play Div. IIs and Div. IIIs. This is a battle-tested team. We knew with our record we weren’t going to be a high seed, but we did enough self-scouting and self evaluation in the region to know we had a pretty good shot.”

It was the second straight season a 13th seed from Region 15 advanced to the regional semifinal. Indian Valley did it last season.

The Potters started off the game in the right direction with a nine-play, 82-yard drive that culminated in a D’Shawn Kirby 5-yard touchdown run to make it 6-0 with 3:24 left in the first quarter.

Kirby also had two catches for 28 yards in the contest but more importantly was a constant disruptor in the Knight backfield.

“He’s a really good player,” Leppla said. “We knew when he was inside it was going to be a tall task for us.”

Cusick was also impressed with the way Kirby closed his career.

“He really raised the bar of his play all year,” Cusick said. “He was very consistent and had a great season.”

West Holmes’ offense sputtered for much of the first half. The Knights’ first score came on a 33-yard field goal by Alex Pringle with 8:05 to go in the second quarter.

West Holmes only got in the end zone with half a second left in the first half on a 1-yard run by quarterback Morgan Smith to make it 10-3 at half. That score almost got away from the Knights though as a time management issue caused several seconds to run off the clock before the Knights desperately called timeout with 3 seconds left.

“They were holding onto the ball and not letting it get set so some time ran off the clock but when your whole entire offense comes over to you in the timeout and says ‘Hey, we want to pound it in’, that’s a pretty easy decision as a coach,” Leppla said.

“That was a killer,” Cusick said.

East Liverpool didn’t back down in the second half as Gavin Wright hit Blake Adkins on a 28-yard touchdown pass to put the Potters in front 13-10 with 8:32 left in the third quarter.

After that the weight of West Holmes’ schedule and experience started to come into play as the Knights added a 12-yard touchdown run by Lynn Cline and a Logan Zollars 66-yard pass from Smith to close the third quarter with an 11-point advantage.

East Liverpool’s offense was deep in West Holmes’ territory three times in the second half but came away with nothing, but it was nine penalties for 90 yards which really held the Potters’ back from a possible second straight upset in the playoffs.

“It was disappointing the amount of penalties we had,” Cusick said. “We really shot ourself in the foot. You can’t do that against a good team like that. They’re very disciplined. We got a little bit too emotional at times when we were reaching and holding. That put ourselves behind the sticks and you can’t do that in the playoffs.”

Wright closed his Potter career with 146 yards passing and 111 yards on the ground.

Smith led the Knights with 214 yards passing and 56 yards rushing.

Game notes

• Total paid attendance was 1,767. It was well below the season-high of 2,500 against Beaver Local. The 50/50 prize was $674.

• In 2022 four 13th seeds advanced to the regional semifinals.

WH: 0-10-14-0–24

EL: 6- 0- 7-0–13

SCORING

E–D’Shawn Kirby 5 run (kick failed)

W–Alex Pringle 33 FG

W–Morgan Smith 1 run (Pringle kick)

E–Blake Adkins 28 pass from Gavin Wright (Kamdin Miller kick)

W–Lynn Cline 12 run (Pringle kick)

W–Logan Zollars 66 pass from Smith (Pringle kick)

——

W E

First downs 15 13

Total Yards 357 293

Rushes-yards 39-143 31-147

Passing 214 146

Comp-Att-Int 13-25-0 11-16-1

Punts 3-48 3-43

Fumbles-Lost 0-0 1-0

Penalties-Yards 4-20 9-90

——

INDIVIDUAL LEADERS

RUSHING–West Holmes, Morgan Smith 20-56, Brody Bowman 14-65; Home, Gavin Wright 18-111, Jaymin Haney 12-31, D’Shawn Kirby 1-5.

PASSING–West Holmes, Morgan Smith 13-25-214-0; Gavin Wright 11-16-146-1.

RECEIVING–West Holmes, Lynn Cline 5-71, Logan Zollars 1-66,Brock Gallion 5-46. East Liverpool, Blake Adkins 3-65, D’Shawn Kirby 2-28, Quintin Conrad 3-22, Meshach Harris 1-20, Owen Fredritz 1-4, Julius Jones 1-14.

INTERCEPTIONS–West Holmes, Brock Gallion.