West Ranch Wildcats 14, Beverly Hills Normans 9
This, friends, was an ugly, ugly game.
I don't mean it was dirty (though the referees certainly seemed to think so: we were flagged over and over and over by the same two refs, the umpire and the linesman on the Beverly Hills side) or that there was taunting or anything.
I mean it was sloppy.
Our defense continues to play very good football, and although Beverly Hills scored 9 points, none of them came from their offense. So from that perspective, it was a shutout. But our offense was horribly inconsistent and sputtering. Our tailback, Sullano, was a bright spot, as was our flanker, Guzman, but otherwise, we have little to be proud of offensively. Bertuch caught a few and managed to complete our trick play to Eichten, but we remain dangerous to ourselves on offense. It was so bad that eventually I started calling our Jumbo group out and we ran our short-yardage offense over and over. It was safe and it ate time: two things we needed.
Our defense, as I said before, played very well. We weren't on defense too much, since we were trying to win the time of possession game, but even so, the Normans weren't able to do anything of note. They drove down deep and were very, very close to our goal line, but we stood firm and stopped them.
A word on what happened next to those spectators who didn't understand.
We got the ball with a few minutes left in the 4th, up 14-7. After an unsuccessful series (and some MORE penalties) we found ourselves in a 4th and very long on our own 5 yard line. I sent in the punt team with instructions for Eichten, the punter, to take the snap and run around in the end zone for as long as he could, then either take a knee or step out the back of the end zone and voluntarily take the safety.
If you don't know, a safety is worth two points to the opposing team, and in addition, the team that surrendered the safety must kick to their opponent from their own 20 yard line.
With the safety, we were ahead 14-9, with just over a minute to play. But we had set up our weapon. Brady "The Leg" Stuart.
We knew he could kick the ball far. So we were not surprised when he booted the ball from our own 20 all the way to the Beverly Hills 15, where it rolled almost into the end zone. A Norman return man scooped it up and managed to get beyond his 20 before we pinned him down. Beverly Hills now had to go about 75 yards in under a minute. Their drive was ended when Gutierrez intercepted a pass and ran it back to the Beverly Hills 5 with 10 seconds left to play.
We told the kids after the game that this offensive performance would simply not do. It might have been strange for them to hear us so angry and disappointed after a victory, but the truth was, we did not win the game: we simply finished with more points than Beverly Hills.
So mark this one as a W, but make it a sloppy, ugly one, won't you?
Next Week: Glendora!
I don't mean it was dirty (though the referees certainly seemed to think so: we were flagged over and over and over by the same two refs, the umpire and the linesman on the Beverly Hills side) or that there was taunting or anything.
I mean it was sloppy.
Our defense continues to play very good football, and although Beverly Hills scored 9 points, none of them came from their offense. So from that perspective, it was a shutout. But our offense was horribly inconsistent and sputtering. Our tailback, Sullano, was a bright spot, as was our flanker, Guzman, but otherwise, we have little to be proud of offensively. Bertuch caught a few and managed to complete our trick play to Eichten, but we remain dangerous to ourselves on offense. It was so bad that eventually I started calling our Jumbo group out and we ran our short-yardage offense over and over. It was safe and it ate time: two things we needed.
Our defense, as I said before, played very well. We weren't on defense too much, since we were trying to win the time of possession game, but even so, the Normans weren't able to do anything of note. They drove down deep and were very, very close to our goal line, but we stood firm and stopped them.
A word on what happened next to those spectators who didn't understand.
We got the ball with a few minutes left in the 4th, up 14-7. After an unsuccessful series (and some MORE penalties) we found ourselves in a 4th and very long on our own 5 yard line. I sent in the punt team with instructions for Eichten, the punter, to take the snap and run around in the end zone for as long as he could, then either take a knee or step out the back of the end zone and voluntarily take the safety.
If you don't know, a safety is worth two points to the opposing team, and in addition, the team that surrendered the safety must kick to their opponent from their own 20 yard line.
With the safety, we were ahead 14-9, with just over a minute to play. But we had set up our weapon. Brady "The Leg" Stuart.
We knew he could kick the ball far. So we were not surprised when he booted the ball from our own 20 all the way to the Beverly Hills 15, where it rolled almost into the end zone. A Norman return man scooped it up and managed to get beyond his 20 before we pinned him down. Beverly Hills now had to go about 75 yards in under a minute. Their drive was ended when Gutierrez intercepted a pass and ran it back to the Beverly Hills 5 with 10 seconds left to play.
We told the kids after the game that this offensive performance would simply not do. It might have been strange for them to hear us so angry and disappointed after a victory, but the truth was, we did not win the game: we simply finished with more points than Beverly Hills.
So mark this one as a W, but make it a sloppy, ugly one, won't you?
Next Week: Glendora!
Posted by Sean
at 9:51 PM |
Permalink to West Ranch Wildcats 14, Beverly Hills Normans 9 |
0 Comments |
