Round two: Spartans host Bruins
SPSV at SHS tonight, 7:30 p.m.
There’s no doubt about it — tonight’s CIF 6-AA Northern California Regional final between defending 6-A state champion St. Patrick-st. Vincent and Socal Regional champion Strathmore is a revenge game.
The last time the Bruins came to Spartan Stadium they beat the undefeated Spartans 29-28 in the state title game on a field goal in the final seconds of the game. But when St. Pat’s makes the over four-hour trip back to Strathmore for the Norcal Regional 6-A game at 7:30 p.m. today, they’ll be facing a determined Spartans team looking to avenge that loss.
“This is a grudge match now,” SHS head coach Jeromy Blackwell said. “Victory was stolen with six seconds left on the clock and these guys mentally are prepared. Fundamentally, schematically these guys have been doing the same plays for 21 weeks. They’ve been waiting for this moment since 51 weeks ago when we woke up on a Sunday and were like, ‘If we could have one more chance’ and bam! There it is.”
After defending their Valley title two weeks ago, Strathmore (140) once again faces the back-to-back North Coast Section Div. V champion St. Pat’s with a perfect record and are coming off a thrilling 53-52 double-overtime win against Sac-joaquin Section champion Hilmar (8-6).
“I feel it’s kind of — I don’t know how Coach Blackwell feels, but I felt kind of bad,” SPSV head coach Lane Hawkins said. “I would’ve rather met them in [the state title game]. I think we’re both two good teams. We’ve proven that over the last two years, and this is no knock on any other team, but I would’ve rather — I thought us playing in a state matchup would’ve been great. Would’ve been great for our communities.”
Fifty-one weeks later and all the “would’ve, could’ve, should’ve” thoughts can now be thrown out the door for the Spartans. Now the team’s focused on the Bruins, and more specifically, containing SPSV running back Marshel Martin and quarterback Akil Edwards.
In their three postseason games Martin rushed for 520 yards and eight touchdowns, including a 231-yard and five-touchdown performance in St. Pat’s 60-44 win over Clear Lake in their section semifinals. Edwards threw for 379 yards and four touchdowns while also rushing for 470 yards and eight touchdowns in the postseason.
Before the Clear Lake rout, St. Pat’s beat Stellar Prep 52-12 in the quarterfinals. In their section title 28-0 win over Middletown, the Bruins’ defense stood out with four interceptions, one returned for a touchdown and six sacks. Edwards rushed for two touchdowns on 95 yards and threw for 140 yards, but had two interceptions. Martin had one big 30yard run, but was held to 75 yards on 16 carries and no touchdowns.
SHS defensive coordinator Scott Bowser said the biggest difference between the defense from last season and this year is that more players are going both ways and they have less depth, but most players are returners with experience, and the secondary is a lot better.
“I think as a whole, I think we’re playing pretty good defense,” Bowser said. “We’re going to make a few changes on defense and give them a few looks they haven’t seen before. Our main focus is to keep [Martin] going sideways, and not let him run downhill on us. And trying to contain their quarterback, he scrambles around a lot.”
Two players that stood out for Hawkins are senior Spartans running back Joseph Garcia and 6-foot-6 quarterback Nick Salas.
“Oh gosh, No. 33, Mr. Garcia, he is a good player,” Hawkins said. “Nick Salas, he throws the ball well. He’s tall so he gets good vision. But Mr. Garcia... he carries the workload for that team and coach Blackwell does a great job. So we know that they’ll be well coached, well prepared and it’s just a matter of us traveling down there and trying to perform again.”
Against Hilmar, Garcia became the sixth player in Central Section history to score 100 career touchdowns after rushing for 239 yards and five touchdowns. On the season, Garcia has rushed for 2,356 yards and 40 touchdowns. In the postseason Salas has completed over 60 percent of his passes for 506 yards and three touchdowns. Against Hilmar he also rushed for a touchdown in the second overtime.
“You know this is what we’ve been working for right here because at the end of the day these are the people that beat us last year and we don’t want a repeat of what happened,” Salas said. “We just want to come out here, go 1-0, work hard, go 100 miles an hour and leave no doubt on the field.”
Strathmore’s road back to the state playoffs has almost been completely against familiar foes with the Spartans beating Orange Cove 24-6 in the Central Section Div. VI quarterfinals and then a 28-20 victory over Orosi in the semifinals. A 42-32 win over Rosamond in Valley title game was the first time Strathmore played a team they hadn’t earlier in the season.
But St. Pat’s isn’t just a familiar foe to the Spartans and they’re ready to lay everything on the line and play to the final whistle.
“That game [against Hilmar] for us was a learning game to never give up,” said junior defensive end Jadon Guire who caused the game-changing fumble at Hilmar. “This game, we’re definitely going to keep going at it. We want some revenge. They’re saying stuff like it’s disrespectful that they have to come here. Well they only beat us in the last couple of seconds and we’re ready for some revenge in this game.”