ORWIGSBURG — If something could go wrong for Lehighton, it did on Thursday night.

After coming off a 49-34 defeat at the hands of Blue Mountain earlier in the season, the Indians met the Eagles again in the District 11 4A quarterfinals — a rematch from last year.

The Tribe shocked everyone with an upset win last year, and were hoping to repeat the script.

However, one unfortunate play led to a domino effect that spiraled out of control, resulting in Blue Mountain pulling away with a dominant 42-7 victory.

Initially, the first quarter played out as if it was going to be a repeat of what happened between these two squads in the regular season.

The Eagles (7-4) struck on their first possession with Cohen Kirby finding Chase Guers from 29 yards out for an early hometown lead. The Indians (5-6) responded late in the quarter on three plays, including a 21-yard run from QB Jayse Lawrence, and then sending a 36-yard pass to Caden Meek to knot the score.

This tie would only remain for 12 seconds, as Kole Luckenbill caught the ensuing kickoff and ran it back 90 yards to put BM back ahead.

After an 11-play drive on its next possession, Lehighton missed a field-goal attempt, which began the downward spiral.

Lukas Croizier was held in check as the Eagles keyed in on him every time he got the ball, frustrating the 1,000-yard rusher and leaving the Indian offense looking for answers. This strategy played out perfect for BM head coach Chuck Kutz.

“I think the most important thing was to get (Croizier) in third and manageable downs, which we didn’t do last time,” he said. “They could just run or pass on us, but this time, they had to sit and pass and then we were able to bring pressure.”

“I think we struggled a little bit upfront,” said Tribe coach Tom McCarroll. “Blue Mountain is a very physical team. We didn’t handle that physicality the way we have in other games, and it came back to hurt us. So when you can’t establish the run game and obviously try to mix it up and stay balanced, it gets a little bit difficult.”

Just under three minutes left in the first half, Eagles’ RB Chase Smith broke free for a 42-yard TD run to extend his team’s lead. Only 59 seconds later, Lawrence’s pass was intercepted by Vaughn Helverson who ran it back 11 yards for a pick-6.

Then, with 38 seconds left, Lawrence had the ball knocked loose by Sonny Amato and returned 35 yards the other way by Brody Foose. In just 2:08 of game time, a one-score deficit magnified into four scores — essentially putting the game out of reach by halftime.

Foose added one more Blue Mountain TD from four yards out in the third to cap off the contest.

While not much could be done to stop the bleeding, coach McCarroll wore the brunt of what happened during that stretch and the game, in general.

“This loss is completely on me; I take full responsibility for this one,” he said. “Clearly I didn’t have our kids ready to roll. I’ve got to get our kids more prepared mentally to go into this type of football game. There’s certain things obviously you can’t control through the course of a game, but I thought that I should have done a little bit more to get our kids mentally prepared.”

Although this year’s senior class for Lehighton is small, it includes the skilled trio of Jayse Lawrence, Caden Meek, and Blake Roberts, all of whom were contained defensively by the Eagles.

Despite leaving with a bitter taste of defeat to end their football careers, coach McCarroll has high praise for what they’ve done for the Lehighton football program.

“These guys have played a lot of football from day one. So many of them have been starters since their freshman year, or early on in their career. The way some of these kids have developed, even some of the kids that came on as juniors and now as seniors, they’re just a special group. I thank them for everything that they’ve done with this program.

“I think they’ve done a great job with their leadership, and I think they’ve set a pretty good blueprint on how we need to move forward.”

WINNER’S REWARD … Blue Mountain will travel to Southern Lehigh next Thursday in its district semifinal matchup. The Spartans blanked Bangor 56-0 to advance.

Blue Mtn. 42, Lehighton 7

Lehighton 7 0 0 0 - 7

Blue Mountain 14 21 7 0 - 42

B - Guers 29 pass from Kirby (Hoover kick)

L - Meek 36 pass from Lawrence (Ebbert kick)

B - Luckenbill 90 kickoff return (Hoover kick)

B - Smith 42 run (Hoover kick)

B - V. Helverson 11 interception return (Hoover kick)

B - B. Foose 35 fumble return (Hoover kick)

B - B. Foose 4 run (Hoover kick)