DANVILLE — The emotions Matthew Blum was working through last Friday night weren’t his alone.

When he finally found the words, Danville’s third-year coach was speaking for his program and an entire community.

After two straight years of heartache, the Blue Devils finally vanquished their demons with a 40-6 win over Eastern in the Region 27 championship game on a cold and rainy November night in Logan. The victory propelled Danville to the state semifinals for the fifth time in program history and first since 2017.

The Devils (12-2) will meet Hillsdale (13-1) in one of two Division VII state semifinals Friday at the Whippet Athletic Complex in Shelby. It was a meeting between Danville and Hillsdale in 2022 that ultimately led to last Friday night.

“There was a lot of sacrifice that went into this,” Blum said last Friday as rain swirled and tears fell.

Revival

The story of the 2024 Blue Devils began before Blum arrived at Danville. 

Former coach Ed Honabarger led Danville to its fourth state semifinal appearance and second in three years in the fall of 2017 and, as is the case with any small-school program, a rebuild of sorts was in order. Danville was 4-6 in 2018 and 2-8 in 2019, Honabarger’s final season in charge.

Cam Smith, who spent one season on Honabarger’s staff, succeeded the coaching icon in 2020 and brought on Blum as offensive coordinator. Danville was 6-3 during the pandemic-altered 2020 season but slipped to 4-7 the following year. Smith stepped down in December of 2021 and Blum, then just 23, was elevated to head coach.

“When I took over three years ago, we hadn’t beaten a team with a winning record in four seasons,” Blum said. “The turnaround that we’ve had … it’s just special.”

In Blum’s first season in charge, Danville was 8-2 during the regular season and qualified for the Region 25 playoffs as the No. 3 seed. The Blue Devils opened the postseason with a 41-18 win over Windham before sixth-seeded Hillsdale paid a visit to Tough Street for what proved to be an instant classic in the regional quarterfinals.

The Blue Devils scored three times in the opening nine minutes and led 21-0 after the first quarter. Danville took a 35-21 to halftime after a frenzied second quarter that featured five combined touchdowns.

The Falcons tied the game at 35-35 with a pair of lengthy third-quarter scoring drives, setting up a wild fourth period.

Danville reclaimed the lead when Max Payne found Walker Weckesser over the middle for a 9-yard touchdown with 6:11 remaining. Hillsdale answered with 1:07 left, but the two-point conversion attempt was no good and Danville led 42-41.

Hillsdale recovered the ensuing onside kick and maneuvered into field-goal range, but a potential game-winning 36-yard field goal with 19 seconds remaining fell short.

“It was a heck of a battle,” Blum remembered. “We had a great game.”

It was the first of three straight thrillers for Danville.

The following week, the Blue Devils overcame a 20-0 fourth-quarter deficit to stun Lucas 27-20 in the regional semifinals at Clear Fork’s Colt Corral. Danville tied the game with 1:23 remaining and won it when Payne again hooked up with Weckesser on a 43-yard scoring strike with 13 seconds showing.

The win sent Danville into the regional final against top-seed Warren JFK. Danville’s storybook run came to a soul-crushing end as JFK scored with 39 seconds remaining and cashed in on a two-point conversion run for a 22-21 regional championship win.

“We were so close in that JFK game,” said senior standout Caleb Lucas, who already was a regular as a sophomore in 2022. “That pain was hard to get over.”

Heartbreak revisited Danville last year as the unbeaten Blue Devils thundered through the first three rounds of the playoffs only to fall to top-seeded Dalton 31-8 in the regional final.

“To lose in the regional final two years in a row was devastating,” senior running back and linebacker Aidan Burke said. “We fed off those losses.”

New-Look Blue Devils

All of the leading actors from the 2022 and 2023 teams — a collection that included nine All-Ohioans spread out over two seasons — had graduated by the time training camp opened last summer. In their place emerged a group of relative newcomers.

“People were really doubting us and what our ceiling was at the beginning of this year,” said Lucas, an All-Ohio third-teamer last year and the program’s newly-minted single-season and career leader in tackles for loss.

“We went through some adversity early in the season, but we’ve put it all together.”

Danville was 3-2 at the season’s midway point after a 41-6 loss to Northmor — a Division VI state semifinalist — in Week 5. The Blue Devils have won nine in a row since then.

“After that Northmor gam,e we really put it all together,” Lucas said. “We decided as a group that wasn’t our identity.”

It all culminated in last week’s regional championship victory. The enormity of the moment wasn’t lost on Blum.

“Words can’t describe this,” Blum said as he fought back tears. I’m just really proud of our kids. All the credit goes to them and the coaching staff and this amazing community.

“I’m really happy for our fans, that they get to experience this. It’s really special.”

For the first time in seven years, the Blue Devils will be practicing on Thanksgiving Day in advance of Friday’s state semifinal game.

“That’s every player’s dream,” Lucas said.

And every coach’s dream, too.

“I’ve always said if I had one goal as a head coach it is to get to a Final Four,” Blum said. “It’s a surreal moment.”

Lucas, one of nine seniors on the roster, isn’t ready for it to end yet.

“Winning a regional championship is everything, but we’re not finished,” he said. “The goal is to play in Canton.”