Ventura St. Bonaventure defeats Corona Centennial, 29-27

Considering that Ventura St. Bonaventure is a 10-time Southern Section football champion and Corona Centennial is a six-time champion, it should come as no surprise that Friday’s season opener produced a championship-like finish.

Players kept digging deeper and deeper. Players got knocked down and refused to stay down. Coaches kept pulling plays out of the playbook usually reserved for Game 14 not Game 1.

In the end, St. Bonaventure’s ability to run the ball in the second half enabled the Seraphs, ranked No. 1 in the Northern Division, to run out the clock over the final 2:51 and come away with a 29-27 victory over the Huskies, ranked No. 1 in the Inland Division.

It was the first home defeat since 2009 for Centennial and its first season-opening loss since 2004 to Long Beach Poly.

Coach Todd Therrien, a former defensive coordinator at St. Bonaventure, put together an offensive game plan to marvel at.

Down, 20-14, at halftime, the Seraphs took it to Centennial and never looked back after Shaun Wick intercepted a pass at the three-yard line on the Huskies’ opening possession of the second half.

Wick later scored on a seven-yard touchdown for a 21-20 St. Bonaventure lead. Then, in the fourth quarter, Therrien had quarterback Marc Evans roll out and fire a six-yard touchdown pass to Spencer Andrews with 4:23 left. Jordan Farris scored a two-point conversion on a reverse for a 29-20 advantage.

Centennial got a 19-yard touchdown pass from Hayden Gavett to Giles Guy-Williams with 2:51 remaining, but the Seraphs’ running game couldn’t be contained. Wick finished with 112 yards in 20 carries and Zach Green had 121 yards in 15 carries and scored a touchdown. And that’s despite St. Bonaventure’s offensive line being called for five holding penalties.

There’s a striking size difference looking at the players filling the position of quarterback and running back at Centennial compared with last season. Gavett is 5 feet 9 and would barely come up to the shoulders of 6-foot-5 Michael Eubank.

Running back Romello Goodman is 5-5 and would have trouble wearing the uniform of 5-9 Barrington Collins.

But that’s what’s so magical about high school sports — size doesn’t matter. It’s more about finding players with desire, intelligence, speed and instincts, and Centennial’s no-huddle, high-scoring offense is still going to produce lots of points and yards with its new personnel. Eight illegal procedure penalties disrupted things Friday.

Goodman finished with 191 yards rushing in 28 carries.

Gavett is the fastest player at Centennial, and that means he’s a threat to run for big gains on option plays. He had 170 yards passing and 42 yards rushing.

eric.sondheimer@latimes.com