Summerville shuts out Esparto with a 31-0 win in D6 quarterfinal
When an unbeaten team is finally handed a loss, it sometimes sends them spiraling. That isn’t the case for the 2022 Summerville Bears, who bounced back from their disappointing 31-6 loss to Sonora two weeks ago with a 31-0 win over the Esparto Spartans Friday night in the second round of the CIF Sac-joaquin Section Division VI playoffs.
The Bears played a “complimentary game of football” with contributions from offense, defense and special teams, according to Summerville head coach Sean Leveroos.
“We got an early turnover and put points on the board, then we had a couple of defensive stands,” Leveroos said of his team’s allaround effort.
After a stagnant start from both offenses, the Bears’ special teams got the scoring started as kicker and wide receiver Dean Trimeloni sent a field-goal attempt through the crossbars with just under five minutes remaining in the first quarter to put Summerville up 3-0.
The Bears didn’t take the pedal off the gas.
Summerville’s offense was too much for the Spartans, who gave up big plays both on the ground and in the air.
“The first one that jumped out was a shot from Braylon to Bryce — a big long throw,” Sean Leveroos said. “Then Kai Elkins had a really long run for a touchdown, and then Dean had a really long catch for a touchdown, so just kind of some built-in shot plays.”
Elkins’ 46-yard touchdown run put the Bears up 31-0 with around two minutes left in the
half. Esparto’s emphasis on stopping the run, which Summerville still executed effectively, opened up big-play opportunities for the team’s deep threats in Bryce Leveroos and Dean Trimeloni.
“We face a lot of coverages that are trying to take away the run, which means that our wide receivers, many times, are getting one-on-one opportunities,” Sean Leveroos said. “We wait to see what the defense declares, then we go and attack what we need to attack.”
The win was highlighted by a number of electric plays, which kept the Bears energized and focused. Two of those plays came in the first half from Summerville’s defense.
First, linebacker Logan Slater recovered the ball after an Esparto ball-carrier fumbled, giving the Bears possession. Then, in the second quarter, safety George Henderson picked off a pass meant for a Spartan near midfield, putting Summerville in a great position to score.
While big plays like those are important, the success or failure of a defense comes down to splitsecond decisions made by players on the field, and their discipline in following their training, according to Sean Leveroos.
“The mundane, boring stuff is why the defense does succeed,” he said. “In that particular opponent that we played, if anyone’s eye discipline is wrong, if anyone is in the wrong gap for their assignment — it’s a mistake. We had a really clean, well-executed game where guys did what they were trained to do and never took the bait.”
The Bears’ last shut-out victory came Oct. 14 in a 47-0 win over the Calaveras Red Hawks. They shut out Bret Harte in another 47-0 victory the week before that.
While the Summerville defense has still been very strong in the weeks since those two previous blow outs, its resurgence against a playoff opponent should be encouraging for the Bears’ title hopes.
The Spartans ran a combination of a wing-t and triple option offense, which Sean Leveroos compared to a mesh of what’s run by Sonora and Argonaut — two teams the Bears have already faced this season.
“We had a good blueprint of, ‘Here is how we did it for this team and here is how we did it for that team,’ ” Sean Leveroos said. “(We) combined the blueprint to
create a defensive gameplan.”
Summerville cooled off in the second half, putting in secondstring players when it became clear victory was at hand.
The big win, and the fact that it followed Summerville’s only loss this season, is symbolic of the team’s fight, Sean Leveroos said.
“I think the edge of a one-anddone tournament that you enter, the kids aren’t ready to go home,” he said. “It was an opportunity for
the kids to reflect on us and what we need to do. In our loss, we didn’t make our one-on-one plays when the opportunities presented themselves.”
The win made this year’s Summerville team tied with one other team in program history to win two playoff games. The Bears have never competed for a section championship, Sean Leveroos said.
With history on the line this
coming Friday night, Sean Leveroos said he hopes the team enjoys the moment.
“No Summerville team has ever won 11 games, so if we win a game Friday night, a couple different historical moments will have been reached: We will be the first team to have 11 wins and two home victories in the process to get there,” Leveroos said. “This could be a really cool first.”