SAN JOSE – It was a tale of two halves Friday night at Valley Christian High School.
Luckily for Serra, it had enough points racked up from the first half to withstand a strong Warriors second-half rally. The Padres beat Valley Christian 28-21 to remain undefeated (6-0, 4-0 West Catholic Athletic League).
Serra, the No. 1 team in the Bay Area News Group rankings, dominated the first half. The Padres scored two touchdowns in the first five minutes, 10 seconds and held a commanding 28-0 lead at halftime.
But No. 12 Valley Christian (4-3, 2-2) outscored Serra 21-0 in the second half and put the outcome in doubt in the final two minutes.
“We needed all of it,” Serra coach Patrick Walsh said about his team’s scoring. “This is a great league … Thankfully, our first half was just a little bit better than their second half.”
Valley Christian coach Mike Machado had a smile after the game.
“I was very proud of the guys, how they came out at halftime and basically executed the adjustments and everything we had for them,” he said. “You can’t help but be excited about a team that comes out down 28 and basically flips the whole script on a team like this. But we know each other very well.”
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Serra took the opening kickoff and drove 62 yards for a score. Petelo Gi, who scored on a seven-yard run, set it up by taking a screen pass from Dominique Lampkin 59 yards.
Gi had quite a first half, tallying more than 100 yards in both rushing (106) and receiving (112 on three receptions). He finished with a game-high 138 yards on the ground and four receptions for 118 yards.
After Valley Christian went three-and-out in their first offensive series, Serra’s Malakai Hoeft took the ensuing punt and returned it 73 yards to give Serra a fast two-touchdown advantage.
“Absolutely huge,” said Walsh about Hoeft’s big play. “It was the difference in the game.”
Valley Christian proceeded to drive to the Serra 8, but a Jakson Berman pass was intercepted on the 1 by Sione Laulea.
Three plays into the second quarter, Serra scored again on a 17-yard run by Lampkin. The 6-foot-2 senior quarterback rushed for 46 yards and completed eight of 12 pass attempts for 136 yards
Serra’s final touchdown, with five minutes left in the first half, showed a little razzle-dazzle. Lampkin handed off to Jabari Mann, who pulled up before the line of scrimmage and executed a nice jump-pass to Seamus Gilmartin for a four-yard touchdown.
“We got a little peek of our best, what we can do,” Gi said. “But while we got the little peek, we still had little mess-ups. We can still get better, way better.”
Valley Christian looked fired up to start the second half, and it showed. The Warriors’ first drive of the third quarter spanned 69 yards on 14 plays, taking 6:50 off the clock. It ended with a two-yard touchdown run by Joshua Minami.
Three plays into the fourth quarter, the Warriors struck again for a touchdown when Berman found Jurrion Dickey in the back of the end zone for a 10-yard pass. Dickey caught a game-high nine passes for 101 yards.
Serra still maintained a double-digit lead until less than two minutes were left in the game. Berman threw another touchdown pass, this time for five yards to Minami, with 1:20 to play. Valley Christian suddenly trailed by only seven points.
But a Valley Christian hard squib kick scooted out of bounds deep in Serra territory, and Serra received the ball on its 35-yard-line with 1:19 left. After two runs for nine yards total by Gi, Lampkin kneeled to end the game.
Berman completed 16 of 32 pass attempts for 154 yards and also rushed for a team-high 73 yards.
Source: www.mercurynews.com