Locals hope Vine Valley proves a beautiful trip

Petaluma and Casa Grande hope for a happy trip to Vine Valley|

Both Casa Grande and Petaluma high school football teams have the dubious pleasure of making the trek to Napa on Friday night.

For Petaluma, the journey is the second in as many weeks to start the Vine Valley Athletic League season. The first time didn’t go so well. The Trojans didn’t exactly visit Napa, they ended up on the collegiate-like American Canyon campus, and the experience wasn’t fun, a 43-16 loss.

This week, they visit Justin-Siena in Napa proper.

Casa Grande, a 36-35 winner over Justin-Siena at Casa last week, will be downtown to take on the Vintage Crushers at Memorial Stadium.

St. Vincent has the only game in town, facing Williams’ Yellowjackets Saturday afternoon (2 p.m. kickoff).

No easy task

Petaluma will have no easy task as it seeks its first VVAL win against a Justin-Siena team that gave Casa Grande all it could handle in a 36-35 loss on the Casa turf last week.

The loss was just the second against three wins for the Braves, who now match the Trojans with an overall 3-2 mark.

Unlike ground-bound American Canyon last week, Justin-Siena will be a more frequent flyer. Quarterback Barrett Dohahoe threw for 280 yards against Casa in a performance that included a 66-yard touchdown connection to Shane Rosenthal.

Petaluma goes calling with a banged-up backfield. All-league veteran Garrett Freitas sat out last week’s loss at American Canyon with a leg injury. His availability was unknown at press time. Although he played last week, fullback Derrick Pomi is only a week removed from hurting his own leg in a game against El Molino. And last week, Dante Ratto was lost to a shoulder injury in the game at American Canyon.

No matter who is playing, the offense has to rebound from its worst outing of the season with pass interceptions, fumbles, blocked kicks and missing assignments contributing to the tumble at American Canyon.

Another big challenge

Casa Grande, after going 0-4 through the pre-league season, started the VVAL with a huge win, gambling and winning on a decision to go for a 2-point conversion late in the game that was the difference in the wild 36-35 win over Justin-Siena.

Things don’t get any easier this week as the Gauchos travel to meet Vintage’s Crushers.

Vintage drew a first-round VVAL bye last week after going 2-2 in pre-league play.

Vintage is strictly a grind-it-out team. In four games, three players have thrown a total of 45 passes, completing 17.

But the Crushers have run the ball 174 times for 828 yards.

Senior Villami Schaumkel has 230 of those yards, while sophomore Jacob Aaron has 143.

The backs run behind a big and experienced offensive line.

Casa Grande put its offense together against Justin-Siena last week, with quarterback Justin Bosarge passing for 120 yards and running for 150 more, while Matt Herrera ran for 93 yards and Alex Johnson 86 more. Jordan Gramajo scored two touchdowns.

Another unknown

St. Vincent faces another unknown Saturday afternoon when it hosts Williams’ Yellowjackets.

The Mustangs can expect to be blitzed from the air by the Jackets.

Seven Williams ball carriers have rushed for 357 yards during a 2-2 season.

However, quarterback Hunter Povlsen has passed for 1,018 yards. In just four games, he has completed 81-of-123 passes for 10 touchdowns.

St. Vincent will be trying to rebound from its first loss, a 54-21 defeat at Burton in San Francisco, after four straight wins to open the season.

During those first five games, the Mustangs have forged an impressively balanced offense with Trent Free passing and Daniel Burelson running.

Gio Antonini, who lines up all over the front line, has led a solid run defense, but the Mustangs have had stretches of trouble on pass defense, something that can’t happen against the throw-happy Yellowjackets.

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