Casa season ends Eagle ugly

The end. The North Coast Section football playoffs began with all four local schools - Casa Grande, Petaluma, St. Vincent and Tomales - represented.|

The end.

The North Coast Section football playoffs began with all four local schools - Casa Grande, Petaluma, St. Vincent and Tomales - represented. One by one, their seasons ended.

Last Friday night, the last local team standing, Casa Grande’s Gauchos, went down and out, losing on the black mat that is the home turf of Clayton Valley Charter School’s Ugly Eagles, 55-3.

The game, pretty much as everyone expected, was a mis-match. Clayton Valley, the No. 1-ranked Division 2 team in the state, scored on every possession except its final ownership when a third-string running back fumbled.

After the game, while his Gauchos mourned the end of the season, and, for the seniors, the end of their high school football careers, Casa Grande coach Trent Herzog was upbeat, focusing on the amazing Casa season more than the end in the semifinals of the North Coast Section Division 2 playoffs.

Casa Grande started the season by losing its first five games, and was 1-6 before rallying to win its last four regular-season games and earn a spot in the palyoffs, where it beat defending NCS Division 2 champion Miramonte and Maria Carrillo before running into the machine that is Clayton Valley.

“I’m very proud of this team,” Herzog said. “They faced a lot of adversity, but they never gave up. They never made excuses.”

By reaching the NCS championship game last season and the semifinals this fall Casa Grande played in 27 games over those two years. “It shows where our program is at,” the coach noted.

The program appears to be in a good position to build on the momentum of the late-season success with a bevy of juniors and sophomores returning after making major contributions to the team’s late-season run.

That run ended against a 77-member Ugly Eagle team that had talent two and three deep at almost every position.

Using their unique tightly packed formation featuring handoffs, reverses, mis-direction and a few wonderments taken out of the David Copperfield playbook, they came at the Gauchos in unstoppable waves. Several times during the quickly played game Casa apparently had Clayton Valley stopped only to give up a drive-sustaining or drive-ending (by way of a touchdown) big play.

Casa Grande flashed a few big plays of its own, including a 70-yard kickoff return by Holton Johnson, but could never reach the end zone. The only Gaucho points came on a 43-yard field goal by strong-legged Matt Abramo following Johnson’s spectacular run down the left sideline.

By then, Clayton Valley had already scored 14 points, the result of a surprise 40-yard pass from quarterback Nate Keisel to tight end Chandler Wakefield and a 15-yard run by Justin Zapanta.

The two scores set a pattern that played out through much of the game until the Ugly Eagles sent in their second and third wave of talented players in the second half. Senior Matt Harrison, who was to gain 197 yards on just 10 carries, forced the Gauchos to load the box in an effort to at least contain his outbursts, and Clayton Valley countered by unleashing another explosive back like Gavin West (73 yards on five carries), Luis Ramos (73 yards on seven carries), Zapanta (72 yards on six carries) or Ryan Cooper (68 yards on six carries). For the game, the Ugly Eagles used seven different carriers to rush for 533 yards. Keisel threw just three times and completed all three for 107 yards.

Yes, they are that good.

The halftime count was 34-3. It was 48-3 at the end of three quarters and the Ugly Eagles tacked on a final touchdown in a fourth quarter that was played with a running clock.

A big - as in 6-feet, 2-inches, 220-pounds - highlight for the Gauchos was the play of senior linebacker Casey Longaker who proved to the section what Casa players, coaches and fans have long known - he can play with the best.

Longaker was all over the field, often providing a one-player line of defense with 11 solo tackles, three for Clayton Valley losses. He also assisted on three other stops.

Playing fullback on offense, he carried six times for 36 yards. On one play in the third quarter, he was hit at the line of scrimmage, but kept battering forward, carrying about half the Ugly Eagle defenders for an 18-yard gain.

That play came toward the end of Casa Grande’s best offensive effort of the night, a 68-yard march from its own 20-yard-line to the Clayton Valley 12 before it expired on downs. Highlight of the drive was a 39-yard pass connection between quarterback JJ Anderson and junior receiver Nic Petri.

Casa did manage to scratch out 94 yards rushing against the swarming Clayton Valley defense, with senior Kevin Donohoe gaining 23 and sophomore Spencer Torkelson 16.

Defensively, the Gauchos received strong efforts from Nick Jensen with eight tackles, Max Cerini and Petri with seven apiece and Donohoe with six.

For the record, Casa Grande finished with a 6-7 mark and was 4-3 in the North Bay League.

Clayton Valley is 13-0. The Ugly Eagles will play rival Concord (12-1) Friday night at Diablo Valley College for the NCS Division 2 championship and a likely spot in the state championship game.

UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy:
  • This is a family newspaper, please use a kind and respectful tone.
  • No profanity, hate speech or personal attacks. No off-topic remarks.
  • No disinformation about current events.
  • We will remove any comments — or commenters — that do not follow this commenting policy.