The door was wide open for Marian to improve its position in the District 11 Class 1A football playoffs.

Friday evening the Colts picked the wrong time to have the offense abandon its playbook. Tri-Valley never overpowered the Colts, but when opportunity knocked the Bulldogs took advantage and handed the Colts a 16-6 loss.

It also sends Marian to the fourth spot in the district playoffs with one game to play at home Friday against Pine Grove. Meanwhile, Tri-Valley is within reach of a second seed, should it knock off rival Williams Valley on the road next week.

“It sure was a big win for us,” Tri-Valley coach Jeff Sampson said. “We did some nice things late and we executed when we had our backs to the wall and got those late scores to keep them off the board was so important.”

Marian has scored a total of 12 points in its last two games.

“We’ve got to trust ourselves, we need to get to six wins,” Stan Dakosty said, obviously disappointed in his team’s inability to put points on the board.

Marian had a tough break on its first drive when they drove into deep into Tri-Valley territory.

Quarterback Bruce Hopeck sat in the pocket, looking foro an open receiver but the wet ball slipped out of his hand and Tri-Valley recovered.

“It wasn’t intentional, we ran a curl,” Dakosty saidy. “We had the guy open.”

Marian had another potential scoring driving deep into Tri-Valley territory only to fizzle out.

Then the Bulldogs went to work marching the length of the field on a well-executed 10-play drive. With 3:07 to play in the opening first half, Tri-Valley struck for the first score. A pass from Blake Schwartz to Shawn Bowman who ran an underneath route, for a 22-yard score.

“We just didn’t execute, every time we did something good we shot ourselves in the foot,” Dakosty said.

Marian floundered in its first possession of the second half. After forcing a Tri-Valley punt. Marian kept the ball for over seven minutes but couldn’t put the ball in the end zone.

Finally the Colts got six on the board when Michael Silliman picked up a fumble caused by a Noah McGuire hit and raced 36 yards to the end zone to tie the score at 6-6.

Tri-Valley pulled ahead on a 35-yard field goal from Schwartz with 7:45 to go in the contest to take a 9-6 lead. Three minutes later the Dawgs added the final touchdown of the night, when Cole Gemberling raced 26 yards to the end zone and Schwartz’s PAT set the final count.

“I’m disappointed to the ‘T’” Dakosty said. “Every time we did something good, a penalty ... we just didn’t execute. You got to something to deserve to win.”

LOST OFFENSE ... Marian’s offense isn’t at the top of its game, and suddenly has disappeared at the wrong time of the season. It was trying to stretch the field with long passes, instead of taking the short game which was present.

TOUGH DAWGS ... Although its offense was lame, Tri-Valley used a lot of determination to shock the Colts. There was nothing fancy, just good hardnosed football.

HORSES FOR SURE ... Jesse Rodino and brother James Rodino were outstanding all evening.