A full week of Homecoming festivities culminated on Friday night at the Warpath as the Portage varsity football team defeated Michigan City 24-21. The Indians held off an upstart Wolves team to improve to 2-5 overall, 1-4 in the Duneland Athletic Conference.
At halftime, Bella Camacho was crowned 2012 Homecoming Queen, topping fellow nominees Courtney Groene, Bri Gibson, Mackenzie Barcelli and Nicole Thomas. Rashaan Coleman, who helped Portage to victory with two touchdown runs, was awarded Mr. Football, as voted on by the football team. The senior class swept Spirit Week, while the juniors took home the Spirit Stick.
The fans poured into the Warpath as a near capacity home-bleacher crowd cheered on the Indians. After stunning Lake Central last week 20-16, the Wolves struck first on a Ryan Washington 13 yard touchdown hurl to Logan Kaletha in the first quarter. Washington, a sophomore, finished the night with three touchdown passes to shoulder the MC load.
Senior defensive back Diondre Griffin came up big for Portage with two interceptions to stall MC drives. Gage Pearman scampered for a seven yard touchdown run to tie the game before halftime. Coleman’s third quarter touchdown run gave Portage the lead. The two defenses locked down for most of the second half until a Nate Johnson 35 yard field goal appeared to ice the game with just 36 seconds left on the clock.
Michigan City put together a surprise strike, scoring just 11 seconds later on an 80 yard Washington pass to Marquis Martin. With 25 seconds left, Michigan City attempted an onside kick, but Portage recovered to escape with a 24-21 Homecoming victory.
After Pearman took a knee to make the victory official, the Portage student section stormed the field in celebration of the Homecoming victory.
Portage will head to Valparaiso next week before closing out the regular season on Oct. 12 against La Porte at the Warpath.
Follow this link for photos from Thursday's Homecoming Parade!