Players from Grant of Sacramento (with head coach Carl Reed holding the ball) celebrate after their last-second victory on Friday vs Rocklin. Photo: Mark Tennis.
Friday’s CIF Sac-Joaquin Section football championships at Hughes Stadium in Sacramento saw one team come up short in trying to get to 13-0, another team succeed in doing that quite easily and finally a thriller in which the winning team three-peated as a section champion.
Note: We won’t be able to duplicate these recaps for the Saturday games in the SJS due to a family commitment plus we will need to spend Saturday night doing our final run through of projections for Sunday’s CIF regional championship pairings. Those should be posted late, late on Saturday night/Sunday AM in time before the CIF commissioners meet to finalize their selections.
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D2
Grant (Sacramento) 30, Rocklin 28
The Pacers, who were No. 23 in the State TOP 50 rankings, took out the Thunder a year ago in the CIF NorCal regional bowl games after both teams won SJS titles. Grant had won the D3 section title while Rocklin (No. 31 in state) had won in D2. This year, the two schools met in the D2 section final after Grant had to move up.
It was a chaotic finish.
Rocklin had taken a 28-24 lead with 8:30 left on a 89-yard pass play that saw junior QB Reeve Sloan drop the ball beautifully down the left sideline to Owen Disalvo, who caught the ball in stride and just beat the final defender falling at this feet to reach the end zone.
The Thunder had a chance to build on their lead, but had to punt with 3:03 left on a 4th-and-8 from midfield. Grant began what everyone knew would be its last chance from its own 2-yard line with 2:51 left. QB Luke Alexander completed three short passes that moved the ball out to the 41 and then with 49 seconds left he found junior Koby Shabazz down the right sidelines for a 41-yard completion that took Grant just 24 yards away. The Pacers had to score a touchdown and after an incompletion Alexander put one into the end zone toward sophomore Zo Edwards. He had made a spectacular catch on a 30-yard play right at the beginning of the fourth quarter and he came up with another one. The touchdown gave Grant the lead with just 34 seconds left.
Rocklin only had 28 seconds left with one time out left to try to get in position for a possible game-winning field goal. Sloan hit on one completion for 12 yards but the plays took too much time. With 12 seconds left, he had to try to throw it toward field goal range but in a crowd it was Grant’s Aric Anderson who caught the ball for the interception.
The Pacers not only topped Rocklin for the second straight year but won their third straight SJS championship. They showed that playing a schedule early in the season against De La Salle of Concord (No. 4 in state), Lincoln of San Diego (No. 12) and Clovis East of Clovis (No. 22) paid off later on.
“This is what we were built for,” said Grant head coach Carl Reed, whose team likely will be matched up against CIF Central Coast Section D1 champion St. Francis of Mountain View (won its game on Friday vs Los Gatos) in the NorCal D2-AA regional final next week. “That’s why we scheduled the games we did. We planned for games like this. It’s what we practice for. Adversity in games like this are going to happen. The key is to overcome and adapt.”
Alexander had a big night throwing for Reed’s offense. He ended with 362 yards passing and four touchdowns. Edwards, a 6-foot-6, 210-pounder who showed he is a receiver and not a tight end in this game and is going to be a matchup nightmare in the next two seasons, had seven catches for 104 yards and two scores. Shabazz, who had two 50-yard kickoff returns during the game as well, had six catches for 127 yards. Brandon Lambert also was more of a weapon catching passes than just churing for yards on handoffs. He had one TD run and one TD catch.
Sloan had an earlier deep pass that was on the button to Mavrik Collins that went for a 71-yard touchdown that pulled Rocklin from a 24-14 deficit to 24-21 with just eight seconds left in the third quarter. Sloan also had an earlier TD pass to Disalvo and one to Connor Kostecki that gave the Thunder leads of 7-6 and 14-12. Grant’s only real blemish on the night was not being able to score on three PAT kicks or two two-point conversion attempts. It almost was costly, but Edwards’ last catch saved the night.
Twelve Bridges head coach Chris Bean stopped for a second to have photo taken in front of Hughes Stadium goal post. Photo: Mark Tennis.
D4
Twelve Bridges (Lincoln) 55, Patterson 7
It’s only been three seasons of Raging Rhinos’ varsity football, but all jokes aside about their unique nickname (it goes along with the Lincoln High Zebras) there’s no joke about what they’re building in the growing Sacramento suburb east of Roseville.
Twelve Bridges didn’t just capture its first-ever section title. It also pushed its perfect record from 12-0 to 13-0 and dominated a Patterson squad to the point where it clearly will be the third highest team from the SJS placed into the NorCal regionals (ahead of the D3 champion). But how high? It may now be D2-A, probably opposite Wilcox of Santa Clara (favored to win the CCS D2 championship on Saturday).
The Raging Rhinos were only ahead 13-7 entering the second quarter and had given up a 73-yard scoring drive to the Tigers. Patterson never scored again and helped Twelve Bridges gain control with a 12-yard punt and another punt that was partially blocked. The lead went to 27-7 in a hurry and it was 34-7 at halftime.
Braeden Ward, one of the leading rushers and scorers in the state, surged for 242 yards on 22 carries and scored four TDs. QB Connor Flaherty connected for three TD passes, went 10 of 13 for 173 yards and he ran it three times for 38 yards.
Twelve Bridges head coach Chris Bean, who started the program after previously serving as the head coach at Lincoln High, was asked if he thought the game would be so lopsided.
“I can’t explain what we witnessed, but there were some demons that were excised from last year,” said Bean, referring to a last-second loss in the section finals to Casa Roble of Orangevale. “Last year’s seniors set the table for us for this season.”
Tanner Navarro’s pick six touchdown in the first half was perhaps the biggest play in Sonora’s 23-20 win vs Bradshaw Christian. Photo: Mark Tennis.
D6
Sonora 23, Bradshaw Christian (Sacramento) 20
The first game of the day featured two teams that have been at the top of the state small school rankings this season. Bradshaw Christian (12-0) was put in the No. 1 position in October and although those rankings weren’t done after the end of the regular season the Pride still should have been considered No. 1 when they took the field on Saturday morning. Sonora was No. 3 early on after an impressive season-opening win over Oakdale (D3 SJS finalist) and then dropped a spot behind league rival Hughson (52-51 loss) and had to drop further after an upset loss at Ripon.
In the D6 section playoffs, playing top seed Bradshaw Christian in the final seemed likely and when the Wildcats got their shot at it on Saturday they took advantage. It was not easy, however.
The Pride had shown tremendous poise in coming back from a 16-7 halftime deficit in which head coach Drew Rickert was ejected for receiving two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. They took a 20-16 lead with 4:43 left in the game on a 9-yard run by Nathan Zeppieri.
The BC defense also had the Sonora offense right where it wanted, facing a 4th-and-5 from the 38-yard line. A stop would have ended the game. Instead, Eli Ingalls tossed a screen pass to Cash Byington for a 19-yard gain. Brody Speer then ran for 19 yards and the Wildcats moved into striking range. They needed a touchdown and almost got it on a dive by fullback Tommy Sutton with 13 seconds left. The Wildcats were able to call timeout and Ingalls scored on a 1-yard keeper with nine seconds left.
“We don’t throw a whole lot, only three times today, but we practice our two-minute drill all the time and were ready for that drive,” said Sonora head coach Kirk Clifton. “Playing Oakdale early helped. It was a great physical game like it always has been and anytime you win a game like that it gives you confidence.”
Mark Tennis is the co-founder and publisher of CalHiSports.com. He can be reached at markjtennis@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow Mark on the Cal-Hi Sports Twitter handle: @CalHiSports
