Panthers hold off Spartans
Retooled line allows SHS’ Garcia to shine
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first in a series of stories leading up to the CIF 6-AA State Championship.
There’s at least five players on a football team that get overlooked each and every game, almost only remembered when something goes wrong, but they’re the ones in the trenches every single night — they are the offensive line.
For the Strathmore Spartans they’re some of the most important players on the field. Leading the run-heavy offense, they’ve created the holes for star running back Joseph Garcia to eclipse 2,000 rushing yards for the second season in a row as well as helping the team get back to the CIF State Championship game. The undefeated Norcal Regional champion Spartans travel to El Modena High School for the Div. 6-AA state title game against the Panthers of Orange (13-2) Saturday at 6 p.m.
But at the start of the season the Spartans’ offensive line was one of the most doubted areas on the team after it graduated five seniors. In many people’s eyes there was no way that Strathmore could replace that many players and be good enough to repeat last season’s state title run.
“We lost five starters on the offensive line, including our other tight end,” offensive line coach Robert Garza said. “So of course it’s natural for people to doubt, how can you replace that many starters. So luckily last year we did have a lot depth in the underclassmen. Naturally they took place into this year starting lineup.”
Seniors Shaylan Singh (right tackle), Robert Alvarez (right guard), Ryan “Knoodles” Knutson (center), Lucas Raya (right tackle), Ethan “The Ethanizer” De La Cruz (guard), Andres Lara (tight end) and junior Jadon Guire (left guard) have all stepped up, and with last year’s experience, established another championship offensive line.
“Coach Garza, he’s taught us ever since we were little, as soon as one player goes down the next person’s got to run with it,” Guire said. “And the [seniors] last year, they really set a base for these guys. They taught them how they played and these guys just went with it. I believe that these guys are better skills-wise, and so they just went with it and they relied on their skills that the other guys taught them and they’re good.”
Running behind this offensive line, Garcia has rushed for a total of 2,626 yards and 45 touchdowns in 15 games — 281 yards and five more touchdowns than last season. In Strathmore’s 49-35 win over St. Patrick-st. Vincent (112) in the regional title game, Garcia rushed for 270 yards and five touchdowns on 44 carries for his second biggest game of the season.
“I just like running behind these guys, I trust them,” Garcia said. “I trust them to make their blocks, to go where they’re supposed to be.”
From the beginning, Garza said he trusted his line’s ability, especially when he saw big games from Garcia — who now averages 175.1 yards and three touchdowns a game.
“Last week was a prime example of that,” Garza said. “That was a very good St. Patrickst. Vincent team and we imposed our will on them and you’d see them get hit and they’d drive and the surge of the line was taking them up to 10 yards backwards. They rushed for 300-and-some yards and that’s a lot in that kind of a game.”
Garza added that against Orange, his Strathmore’s line matches up well and are capable of imposing their will once again.
“They look like they’re a very decent defensive line, but our guys, like I say, they usually impose their will on the [defensive line] and they drive,” he said. “And they do what they do. I think if we play our game, they should be successful at what we do.”
Not only has this season’s line been as successful as last year’s by also winning the East Sequoia League, Valley and titles, but they’ve done so while playing both ways. Defensive end Lara and defensive tackles Guire and Alvarez, as well as nose guards Singh and Raya, also make up the starting defensive line.
“I love football, you can never get tired,” Guire said. “Your body gets tired but mentally, even though this is like our job, we come out here and it’s just like playing another sport that we love with the people we love, our brothers, so you can never get tired of it.”
Knowing that so many people doubted their potential as a championship offensive line just shows the Spartans how hard they’ve worked to get back to the title game.
“It just means we worked hard again,” Lara said. “We just worked our butts off to get to here again. And we have a lot of trust in our team, so we just worked hard all the way through hell week ’til now. So we got to keep working hard to win this game.”
Garza added that rather than phase the team, the doubt just gave them motivation.
“When you get doubted, ‘Oh can those guys be able to replace last year’s line’ and I believe that was our motivation as a group,” he said. “We will have a great line and we will do the same or better. I think we’ve proven that fact, that they have put in a lot of work in the offseason and they got to this point again and they’re trying to finish their season.”