Reusse: Carleton quarterback Jack Curtis goes out competing hard right to the end

NORTHFIELD, MINN. – There was a blue sky, a brisk breeze, a temperature in the 50s and an early (noon) kickoff at Laird Stadium on Saturday. What more could one ask for a mid-November football game here in our often Frozen Wasteland?

In the case of the home team, the Carleton Knights, it would have been a victory over Concordia (Moorhead) to complete a 7-0 sweep in the reality portion of the schedule. Yes, this is Division III football in the 2000s, and there will be selected games where victory is a pipe dream for Carleton — an academic citadel with limited manpower.

There are now two such annual opponents in the MIAC, with Bethel and St. John’s ruling the 10-team collection. And then Carleton coach Tom Journell added a third by opening this season at Wisconsin-Whitewater: No longer dominant across the border, but still powerful.

The Knights had been outscored 143-31 in those losses (all on the road), yet they were a splendid 6-0 against MIAC opponents on the same D-III plane — a bid for perfection that did not escape Owen Detmer, a senior and relentless competitor in the secondary for the Carleton defense.

“Those three losses, you go in with your best effort, but they are way up there,” said Detmer, raising his right arm. “Concordia, that’s a good football team, too, but we wanted to win those seven games.”

It didn’t work out that way: Cobbers 31, Knights 24.

The Knights didn’t get the seven wins they wanted for every teammate, especially Jack Curtis, the senior quarterback who produced astounding numbers in Journell’s wide-open passing attack despite undergoing chemotherapy treatment for late Stage 2, unfavorable Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

The Curtis story has been told — now nationally. Initial treatments back home in Charlotte, N.C., this summer, a late arrival for fall practice, chemo every other Monday at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, a powerful injection the next day, very limited practice … and then huge passing numbers on Saturday.

When the chemo finally ended, the opponent was Bethel, the MIAC’s best, and Curtis’ right hand was struck throwing a pass early in a 49-7 loss and he had to leave early with breaks in two fingers.

“We won’t know until Thursday if he can play Saturday against Concordia,” Journell said early in the week.

A text from the coach on Friday was succinct: “Jack’s good to go tomorrow.”

The grip wasn’t the same, the throws wouldn’t be as crisp, but it was Senior Day, his parents Scott and Amy, two siblings and his girlfriend were here from Charlotte, and he already had been through much worse than pain in gripping a football.

Curtis threw a very early interception on a ball that seemed to wobble from his hand. He came back with a 73-yard touchdown pass.

On it went. The Knights trailed 31-24 in the fourth, then drove 64 yards to the Cobbers 1. Journell sent in backup Nick Toole to plunge into the end zone. Two rushes lost a yard, and the tying touchdown never came.

Curtis was after that touchdown later at midfield, but he was sacked by two Cobbers and then was down, in anguish, grabbing the damaged right hand. Postgame, after emotional hugs with teammates, his parents and his other loved ones, he was asked, “What happened?”

Curtis: “My fingers were hit and they were broken again.”

He was escorted from the field, to a bench behind the sideline. The career, the amazing senior season, was over. Or so it appeared.

Carleton took over after a punt at its 10. The clock read 1:59, and here came Curtis, with his re-damaged fingers. He started throwing. Timeouts were gone and the last gasp was stopped at the Concordia 45.

“Were you throwing the ball out of your palm at the end?” Curtis was asked.

That was not the case, he said: “I was gripping it as best I could.”

Then, Jack Curtis, after going 37-of-56 for 344 yards with three TDs and an interception — putting his season totals at 3,120 yards, 29 touchdowns, seven interceptions and 284 completions in 392 attempts (72.4%), as a fourth-year quarterback and cancer patient — said: