San Clemente Feels Fortunate to Earn Tie With Trabuco Hills
It won’t go down as a victory, but it sure felt like one to San Clemente Coach Mark McElroy after his team scored 16 points in the final 9 1/2 minutes to force a 26-26 tie with visiting Trabuco Hills Friday night.
“Unbelievable,” McElroy said. “The team that comes back always feels like they earned some sort of victory. I said before the game this was going to be a great high school football game and it was.”
But it also had a pretty strange ending. Seventh-ranked Trabuco Hills (6-1-1, 2-0-1) appeared to be driving toward a potential game-winning field attempt. But as the Mustangs approached midfield with 1:30 remaining and one timeout, they surprisingly let the clock run out.
“We’re not a real good passing team,” Trabuco Hills Coach Bill Crow said. “[Quarterback] Brandon Heaney’s heel was hurting and we didn’t want to chance a pass. In hindsight, we might have . . . we should have. . . . I don’t know what to say. It was a hell of a high school football game.”
Said McElroy: “I don’t like to second guess coaches very much. I don’t like to be [second-guessed] myself. They’re mostly a ball-control team, so maybe they didn’t want to take chances. “
Trabuco Hills didn’t need to take chances most of the night. All the Mustangs had to do was shove the ball down the Tritons’ throats.
Running back Al Gandall scored two of Trabuco Hills’ three first-half touchdowns and rushed for 83 yards. He didn’t slow down in the second half as he rushed for another 102 yards, but he did fumble the ball at a critical point.
With Trabuco Hills leading, 26-18, and on the verge of putting the Tritons away, Gandall had the ball stripped by linebacker Bryan Hadley at the end of a 45-yard run. Linebacker Adam Little recovered the fumble at San Clemente’s 29.
“He hadn’t fumbled all year,” Crow said of Gandall, who had 185 yards in 32 carries. “He’s been running like that all year, getting that extra yard. I’m not going to say anything to him now.”
Three plays and 71 yards later, San Clemente was in the end zone. Sophomore Andy Coviello completed a 14-yarder to Chris McCormack and a 38-yarder to John Morgan, who was hit late, adding another 10 yards to the play. Coviello then hit Justin Lucas on a nine-yard comeback pass to make it 26-24 with 7:39 remaining.
San Clemente’s comeback began late in the first half when it trailed 20-3 with 31 seconds remaining. After Gandall’s three-yard touchdown run, Chris Roesti busted a kickoff return 79 yards to Trabuco Hills’ 13. Two plays later, Coviello hit McCormack on a 13-yard screen pass to trim the lead to 20-10.
In another South Coast League game:
Dana Hills 37, Capistrano Valley 23--Dana Hills (3-5, 1-3) capitalized on two turnovers in the second half. Tommy Gallups scored one of his two touchdowns on a 99-yard kickoff return in the fourth quarter to extend Dana Hills lead to 30-23.
Ryan Richards scored in the second quarter for Capistrano Valley (3-5, 0-3).