De La Salle hung on for the 28-21 victory. Afterward, Ladouceur stood before his exhausted team. It was by far the biggest victory in school history at the time, but the coach noticed that several of his players wore masks of disappointment. "It's OK to feel disappointed if you didn't play your absolute best," he told them. "That's what we're all about.

He hadn't developed into the accomplished running quarterback many had predicted he would become over the course of the season.But he had come to personify this team. He was raw and untested when the season began, but he played his two best games in the two biggest games on the schedule. He wasn't the player anybody expected him to be, but he got the job done-at times spectacularly.