During the week leading up to his team’s state tournament play-in game against North Mason at Silverdale Stadium in Silverdale, Interlake head coach Sheldon Cross challenged his team with a question. Who would be the big hero? Who would be the hero that makes the play that seals the game?

Chris Motley waited until the game’s biggest moment to give a commanding answer.

The senior defensive back picked off Bulldogs quarterback Daniel Baker at North Mason’s 24-yard line with less than five minutes left in the game to preserve Interlake’s seven-point lead and send the Saint’s to the Class 2A state tournament round of 16 with an eventual 35-20 win.

The Bulldogs, who rallied back from a 20-0 deficit, looked to have life after forcing the Saints to turn the ball over on downs on the North Mason 13-yard line. The Bulldogs offense quickly picked up a first down and were looking to tie the game when Motley picked off Baker’s pass and sealed the victory.

“It’s my senior year and I didn’t want our team to go home after one playoff game,” Motley said. “I knew I just had to make a play. And it got the ball back to our offense and they punched it in.”

Interlake (6-4) junior running back Brett Kirschner scored an insurance touchdown with 2:44 left in the game on the ensuing Saints drive to put them ahead by 15 following a successful two-point conversion. It was Kirschner’s third touchdown of the rain-soaked game and his second rushing score of the night.

The game got off to an ominous start for the Saints, whose coaches discovered in the minutes leading up to kickoff that the headsets used to relay plays from the coaches in the press box to the coaches on the sideline were not working and instead, information was passed to Cross through a cell phone.

But whatever malfunctions that maligned the Saint’s headset’s had no effect on the Interlake offense, which looked electric early and scored on their opening drive when quarterback Matt Malos connected with junior receiver Dylan Amell on a 13-yard scoring strike.

“We weren’t sure how our guys were going to handle the playoffs,” Cross said. “But we came out fired up and got on the board first and showed that we’re a dang good football team.”

The Saints then forced North Mason (7-4) into a second-successive three-and-out, and scored again nine plays later when Kirschner pounded in the ball from the one-yard line. The score was set up by a long Malos-to-Amell pass that got the Saints deep into Bulldogs territory. The pair hooked up for another score, this time a 23-yard pass, with little over a minute gone in the second quarter to put Interlake up 20-0.

Malos finished with 302 yards passing and Amell hauled in seven receptions for 162 yards and the two scores.

“You could see early that we were playing like a KingCo team,” Cross said, referring to the Saint’s participation as a 2A team in the 3A league. “But we kind of let up off the gas and I’m not happy about that.”

The Bulldogs finally broke through with 7:12 left in the first half when Baker lunged into the end zone from a yard out. The senior quarterback led the Bulldogs offensively with 22 rushes for 101 yards.

After the Saints turned the ball over on downs on the North Mason 4-yard line, it looked like the Bulldogs would cut further into the lead but Christian Larzalere picked off Baker at the Interlake 5-yard line just before the half after the quarterback sailed a throw over the head of his 6-foot-5 tight end John Fullington,

Kirschner scored what would turn out to be the deciding touchdown on the Saints first drive of the second half, on an 18-yard swing pass that Cross attributed to a suggestion from his friend and former record-setting Washington State University quarterback Jason Gesser, a guest of Cross’s sitting in the press box above the field.

“That was all Gesser,” Cross said with a laugh after the game. “He called that one at halftime. He asked if he could come out and be an extra pair of eyes for me up there and it helped out.”

A pair of turnovers – a Malos interception and a fumble – helped North Mason get within seven points with a pair of 1-yard runs by Baker and senior fullback Lonnie Hoover before Motley’s late interception gave the ball back to the Interlake offense, where Kirschner’s third touchdown of the night etched the victory in stone. The junior finished with 186 yards rushing and two scores, plus the game-winning 18-yard reception in Interlake’s first state playoff appearance since 1985, when the Saints lost to Juanita in the AAA (now Class 4A) semi-finals.

“Our guys really persevered,” Cross said. “Right when we needed it the most, we made a play to seal it. It’s great to get a win and for these guys to understand what it’s like to win in the playoffs.

“It’s a huge win for our program. It’s been 23 years of a drought since we last made the playoffs. This is a huge stepping stone for our program.”

Interlake will face Lynden (8-2) Saturday at Civic Field in Bellingham at 7 p.m.

“We got the job done early tonight and then we let our guard down,” said Motley. “We can’t do that against Lynden.”

Joel Willits can be reached at 425-453-5045 or at jwillits@bellevuereporter.com.