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Commentary Werbin's gutsy performance proves pivotal By DON HUNT No one knew how effective Jimmy Werbin would be in the Class 4A state championship football game Saturday. Or how long he would last. "One big hit and we knew that would probably be it," Ashland coach Jim Nagel said. "We just kept our fingers crossed." Werbin, the Ashland quarterback who suffered a slight shoulder separation in the Grizzlies' semifinals victory over Jesuit the previous week, didn't throw a single pass until Friday's practice. Nagel had planned for his QB to get in some work Thursday, "but his doctor thought it would be better to wait one more day." Werbin played miserably for most of the first half, completing only 3-of-9 passes. But one of those completions was a 74-yard touchdown strike to Jay Kuester, and that play allowed the Grizzlies to be in the hunt at the intermission, trailing 17-10. When the smoke cleared Saturday, Werbin was one of the heroes. He finished the day 14-of-30 for 259 yards and three TDs, including a 28-yarder to Kuester in overtime as Ashland ran off with a 29-23 win and the Class 4A state championship. "The shoulder felt pretty good at the start, but I was definitely rusty," Werbin said. "I guess I needed a half to get warmed up." Truth be known, has had his struggles. He has been off target in the early going of several games this season, and he has a bad habit of throwing into coverage. "He's driven Jim (Nagel) crazy just about every game," says Scott Chadick, the team's quarterbacks coach who relays plays into the game after Nagel sends them via a phone line from the press box. "Coach will say stuff like, `Jimmy, don't throw the ball over there! Jimmy, throw the ball away! Jimmy, you're making me pull my hair out and I don't have much left!."' But just when you think Werbin is about to self-destruct, he'll rifle the ball through the smallest of openings for a first down, then throw a touchdown on the next play. "He's a blessed child," Chadick says. "I've seen plays where you just know Jimmy is going to throw an interception, and somehow the ball makes it to the ground. It's like an angel comes along and sweeps the ball away." The congregation at First Baptist Church in Ashland, where Chadick and Werbin spend their Sunday mornings, prayed for the QB to be on the field Saturday, Chadick says. The prayers were answered and Werbin wound up doing what he's done all season: look bad, look good, look bad, look good and then, when the game's on the line, look great. It was that way in Ashland's first game of the season, when Werbin threw a touchdown pass on a fake punt in the fourth period that lifted the Grizzlies to a six-point win over Hermiston. And it was that way in the last game, when Werbin and Kuester finished their high school careers in storybook fashion. "We improvised on that play," said Kuester of the game-winning TD pass. "The pass was supposed to go to the inside, but that was covered, so I broke to the outside and Jimmy hit me. "We've been playing together for three years now, first on JV and now varsity. We know how to read each other." Werbin's performance Saturday helped mark the sixth time in 14 games this season that Ashland has won by a touchdown or less. The Grizzlies' five playoff opponents could well be mumbling, "We're better than them," or "We should have beaten them." And yet, none did. "If you walked around our campus and saw some of our kids, you wouldn't say, `Hey, there's a Class 4A state championship team,"' Nagel says. "On paper, this team really didn't have it, but as a much more famous coach than I said, `Paper don't play."' WHILE WERBIN, KUESTER and Joel Smith made the big plays for the Grizzlies Saturday, place-kicker Sean Schorovsky quietly did his job. Schorovsky, a junior who plays on all of the special teams and serves as a backup tight end and defensive end, had to make a pressure-packed kick to tie the game after the Grizzlies had pulled to within 23-22 with 51 seconds to play in the fourth period. He hammered it right through the uprights. All I was thinking was, `Do it for the team,"' Schorovsky said. Schorovsky had an extra-point attempt bounce off the left upright but he also made a 26-yard field goal and was prepared to win the game in overtime with his leg. "But I won't argue with what Jimmy (Werbin) and Jay (Kuester) did," Schorovsky said. UNTIL THIS YEAR championship games that were tied through regulation were not broken with overtime. Nagel and Roseburg coach Thurman Bell both said they favored OT and not crowning co-champions. Bell's 1990 squad tied Tigard for the title. "The way we came back at the end (of the fourth period), a tie wouldn't have felt all that bad," Nagel said. "But a win feels a lot better." Today's Sports Index Mail Tribune Copyright� The Mail Tribune 1998, Medford,