Championship Friday
Hawks host Wolves with 4A Southwest region title on line
Gila Ridge has qualified for the state playoffs in football only once in school history, and that was seven years ago.
Win tonight, and the Hawks will be back.
Gila Ridge (6-2 AIA, 3-0 region) will host Estrella Foothills (4-4, 2-0) tonight in the de facto 4A Southwest region championship game, with the winner securing a spot in the 16-team 4A state playoffs.
This is the closest the Hawks have come to sniffing the playoffs since playing Lake Havasu for a section title in the 2014 regularseason finale. Gila Ridge lost that game, and then went a combined 10-20 over the next three seasons prior to this one.
“This is definitely where we all envisioned this program getting,” second-year coach Corey Semler said. “After the program’s had a rough last two years going 1-9 (in 2016) and 3-7 (in 2017), having this 6-2 turnaround just shows the hard work that these boys and my staff have put in.”
Gila Ridge actually opened this season with losses to Brawley (Calif.) and Central (Calif.), but has won six straight since — with the defense leading the charge.
The Hawks have allowed just 8.0 points per game during this current winning streak, and last week in a 38-17 win over Youngker, the team’s offense delivered arguably its best performance of the year with 412 total yards.
“The defense always shows up, that’s never been an issue,” Semler said. “It’s just offensively we kind of play in spurts.”
Junior quarterback Kaleb Cota, who was benched at one point earlier this season, is the key to the offense’s consistency, because the Hawks feel they’re set at the other offensive skill positions.
Last week, Cota completed 16 of 24 passes for 252 yards and three touchdowns while adding a score on the ground.
“When we take care of the football and hit the open guy, it all just kind of falls on Kaleb Cota,” Semler said. “We’ll go as far as Kaleb Cota can go. We all know what (junior running back) Renan (Duarte) and the other guys in our backfield can do, but it’s about getting our players the ball in space and that’s on the shoulders of Kaleb Cota this Friday.”
Estrella Foothills, meanwhile, has an offense more than capable of putting up points, with an average of 33.6 points and 376 yards per game so far this season.
Pit that against Gila Ridge’s defense, and it’ll be strength vs. strength when the Wolves have the ball.
The key to defending Estrella Foothills, Semler said, comes down to this — slow down senior quarterback Mason Skrimager.
“It’s no secret that the best athlete in that school is the quarterback,” Semler said. “He’s the real deal.”
Skrimager (5-foot-11, 175 pounds) has completed 54 percent of his attempts for 1,507 yards and 16 touchdowns to just two interceptions, and is also the Wolves’ leading rusher with 637 yards and 11 touchdowns on 74 carries.
The Wolves, Semler said, run a spread offense with a lot of run-pass options for Skrimager, who is in his first year at Estrella Foothills after moving in from Oklahoma.
Semler said Skrimager is the best dual-threat quarterback the Hawks have seen this year — but that it goes both ways.
“Estrella’s points come from him extending the play and I really like our front seven,” Semler said. “I think we have the most athletic front seven that he’s faced, and that’s what’s going to be the difference.”