Pierce Conjures Up Familiar Scenario in Brahma, 27-14

The Brahma Bowl, previously thought to be a recreational facility where male bovine donned two-tone shoes and rolled strikes and spares, proved instead to be a football game.

And if you can overlook four big turnovers and 209 yards in penalties, or happen to be a fan of Pierce College, it wasn’t all that bad of a football game.

In the end, the Pierce Brahmas reaffirmed the belief that they are as unbeatable in their own Shepard Stadium--and against Moorpark College wherever the game is played--as the lions were in the Roman Coliseum.

Pierce unraveled a close game with two touchdown passes from Josh Davis in a 10-minute span in the second half of Saturday night’s game en route to a 27-14 victory over Moorpark in the inaugural Brahma Bowl.

The win ran Pierce’s win streak at Shepard Stadium to 15 games and its win streak against the Raiders to 11 games. The Brahmas haven’t lost at home since 1982. They have never lost to Moorpark.

The thumping of the Raiders left Pierce, champions of the Southern California Conference for the third straight year, with a 9-2 overall record. Moorpark, which captured a share of the Western State Conference championship for the first time since 1970, finished 8-3.

“I feel good that the season is finally over,” Pierce coach Jim Fenwick said. “It’s been an awfully long season, but a real rewarding one. Our goal all along was to win the conference, go to a bowl game and win the bowl game. We’ve gone as far as we could go.”

Pierce, which held a 14-7 halftime lead despite gaining only 106 yards, boosted its lead to 21-7 early in the third quarter when Davis hooked up with Greg Eskridge on a 56-yard touchdown pass. Eskridge caught the ball at the Moorpark 35 and out-sprinted four defenders to the end zone.

For Moorpark, the sight of Eskridge streaking towards the goal line was all too familiar. In September of this year, Eskridge hauled in a 75-yard touchdown pass in the closing minutes of the game, giving Pierce a 31-28 victory over Moorpark.

Moorpark seemed on the verge of climbing back into the game a few minutes later when Darin McLeish--who was picked as the Brahma Bowl’s most valuable player of the game along with Pierce’s Eskridge--intercepted his second pass of the game. Quarterback Ken Lutz followed the interception by hitting Dan Russell with a 55-yard pass. A late hit penalty on Pierce gave Moorpark a first down at the Pierce 11, but a moment later Jim Bittner Jr. fumbled at the one and Jeff Armstead recovered in the end zone for Pierce, ending the Raiders’ threat.

Pierce finished off the Raiders early in the fourth quarter when Davis hit Mark Schrater with an eight-yard touchdown pass that made the score 27-7. Moorpark mustered only one more attack that resulted in a 33-yard touchdown pass from Lutz to Dan Russell, ending the scoring.

Lutz finished with 255 passing yards and Russell caught six passes for 159 yards. The two, former teammates at Royal High in Simi Valley, were named Friday as honorable mentions on the Junior College All-America list.

Josh Davis finished with 154 passing yards for Pierce, while Eskridge caught eight passes for 119 yards.

The Brahma Bowl began with a whimper as Lutz drilled a 35-yard pass into the jersey of wide receiver Paul Davis on the first play of the game. But Davis, who had beaten the secondary and had no defenders between him and the end zone, reacted to the ball as if someone had tossed him something a bull might leave in its corral. The ball bounced off his arms and out of bounds.

Moorpark was forced to punt three plays later, but got the ball back when Armstead was called for roughing the punter. Moorpark returned the favor, though, as an errant pass from Lutz was intercepted by Tim Morrison at the Pierce one yard line.

Pierce gave the ball right back, however, when Josh Davis overthrew his receiver on Pierce’s second play of the game and McLeish picked it off for Moorpark at the Pierce 31. The Raiders then took a 7-0 lead midway through the opening quarter when Bittner, son of Moorpark Coach Jim Bittner, crashed into the end zone from the four.

The 31-yard scoring drive was made possible by another personal foul on Pierce’s Armstead, this one following a 10-yard pass from Lutz to Kyle Opp. The 20-yard gain gave Moorpark a first down at the Brahmas’ 10, and Bittner scored three plays later.

Pierce tied the score with 4:35 left in the opening quarter after Anthony Sargent returned the kickoff 77 yards. Moorpark’s Matthew Harrell ran Sargent down from behind at the 20, but it only delayed the touchdown as Tyrone Beaulieu dove into the end zone from the one on the eighth play of the series.

Pierce had just 21 total yards in the opening quarter, but the Brahmas grabbed a 14-7 lead with 5:12 left in the second quarter on a four-yard run by Robert Davis, who set up the scoring run with a 15-yard sweep around right end on the previous play.

Moorpark’s Kevin Greene missed a 27-yard field goal on the first play of the second quarter, pulling it to the right of the goal post. Given another chance at a 27-yard field goal on the last play of the second quarter, Greene did not make the same mistake. He shanked it to the left.