By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
GERVAIS, Ore.– Johnny Mariano once again showed why he’s a tough out.
For the second straight game the Gervais senior surpassed 200 yards and for the second straight game, went for six touchdowns.
And the result was the same: The Cougars win and Gervais live to fight for another week following their 44-29 victory over Douglas on Friday night. Four of those six touchdowns came in the second half as Gervais turned a 14-7 lead at halftime into a 44-15 lead with 4:30 left in the game.
“We’ve been focusing a lot on the running game the last few weeks and trying to perfect our main thing that we do and just pounding the ball,” Mariano said, now having 12 touchdowns in two games for the Cougars.
“It’s a great opportunity for us. We’ve changed a lot here for this school and the football team and it’s a great opportunity to play in another Semi-final game…I see us going all the way and it’s a great opportunity. We need to practice all the way this week, working hard. Conditioning a lot more and perfecting our craft.”
Their halftime talk was to mellow out the nerves after a fast start to the game, and adrenaline jump points Head Coach JJ Navarette, that saw his squad race out to a 14-0 lead at the 3:36 mark of the opening 12 minutes of the game.
And once that adrenaline jump wore off, that’s when the Trojans drew them back in. A Ryder Sawyer to Nalo Driscoli fourth-down touchdown pass made it a 14-7 Gervais lead going into the second quarter before both team’s defenses pitched a shutout in the second quarter. It created that 14-7 score going into the last 24 minutes of the 3A Quarterfinal Game on Friday.
“When we went in there for halftime, we said, ‘you can’t play like that. We can’t have adrenaline jumps. We got to come out in the second half and we got to put it away’ and that’s what happened. We ran right behind 21 and he took care of us with those big plays,” said Navarette “But at the end of the day, these kids are resilient and they show it. No one ever gave us a shot in 11-man to get to the playoffs and here we are going into the Semi’s.”
This moment, going to the Semi’s wouldn’t have been possible of it wasn’t for that refocusing coming out of halftime and seeing their hardwork turn into points and seeing their defense allowing that lead to grow to nearly 30 points. Two late scores by Douglas, a Sawyer to Driscoll connection and a Sawyer to Landon Hinshaw passing strike after an onside kick, brought teh Trojans back to within 15 with two minutes remaining.
But Gervais recovered the next onside kick, and were able to close out the game and allowed the Cougars to return to the State Semi’s, and first time in 11-man since 1951. Last year’s State Semi’s appearance was in 2A’s 9-Man classification.
For this Senior Group. the 14 seniors on the roster this year, to go from three wins as freshmen, to 2A Quarterfinals as sophomores and now Semi-final appearances the last two years, it’s an amazing feeling as they now prepare for the next big game in front of them against the Challengers of Cascade Christian.
“This moment is like the best feeling ever. We’re making history. Last year we were in 2A and we got here, now we’re in 3A and we got here and it’s the best feeling,” said Ben Cam.
“It’s the hard work that these guys have put in from seventh-grade all the way on to what we have right now. But the one thing about it is, it just shows that it’s Gervais in 9-Man, it’s Gervais at 11-man or whatever they want to put us at. These kids want to compete. They want to run through a wall for me and I want to run through a wall for them,” said Navarrette.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
