Vintage shows off big play ability in victory over Acalanes
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
Winning football games at the varsity level doesn’t always come easy. In fact, it’s very rare that they do come easy.
The Vintage football team found that out on Friday night when they avenged last year’s loss to Acalanes-Lafeyette with a 28-20 victory in a game that had a playoff-type of feel to it.
“It’s like round three type (of an) atmosphere,” Vintage coach Dylan Leach explained. “So, that’s where we want to be, and we want to play these teams in order to put yourself in that position. So, I thought our kids were absolutely in shape. I thought we did great. We were the hammer, not the nail.”
But it certainly was hard-earned when the game came down to the final play for the second consecutive year. With less than four seconds left, Acalanes quarterback Brady Hutchingson heaved a hail mary to the end zone where it fell harmlessly to give Vintage the win.
Vintage junior wide receiver Reid McCaffrey agreed that this is a big win.
“Yes, it’s a big win for us, especially for my teammates who left us last year,” he said. “And it feels great to come out and beat them.”
Heading into halftime it appeared one team would need to seize momentum in order to claim the victory. That exact thing happened with only 1:25 left in the first half when McCaffrey fielded an Acalanes kickoff at the one-yard-line and took it all the way to house for a 99-yard return that gave the Crushers (3-0) a 14-13 lead heading into the break.
“Everything went right,” McCaffrey explained. “Everybody blocked the right person. Everybody basically did everything they could possibly do on that and to the best of their ability.”
“It’s exciting, it gets the crowd involved,” Leach said of the importance of McCaffrey’s big play. “It just gets us excited. It puts points on the board, and it keeps their offense off the field.”
The first score of the game came when Hunter Ridley nailed a 32-yard field goal with 10:35 left in the second quarter.
Vintage found the scoreboard when Bill Chaidez found the end zone from nine yards away with 6:11 left in the half. Chaidez came in for Jacob Aaron who left the game in the first quarter with an injury and didn’t return.
“Those guys get equal reps in practice,” Leach said of going to Chaidez. “So, it’s not a big deal to me. I mean, obviously losing Jacob is huge, right? He’s our guy, and we know that. And he’s a great player. But, we feel like if that situation arises, we have a guy that got tons of reps in practice.”
Jake Delaney’s two-yard touchdown run with 1:39 left in the half gave Acalanes (2-1) a 10-7 lead. Following McCaffrey’s return, Ridley kicked a 36-yard field goal with 1.1 left in the half.
With 8:36 left in the game sophomore running back Dylan Smith broke away for a 73-yard touchdown run, which was the score that put the game away.
“Yeah, it was great. I mean, here’s the thing they were they played off of on one side or strength,” Leach said of the sophomore’s long run. “So, (they) just gave us a whole, we saw it, we called the play and, the rest is history. He does what he does. We know he has that in him. So, we’re going to give him those opportunities.”
In their first drive of the second half, the Crushers found paydirt when Chaidez found Ian Avalos for a nine-yard touchdown.
The Dons’ last score of the night came when Brady Huchingson found Lucas Eppinger on a screen pass for a 50-yard touchdown.
The schedule won’t get any easier for Vintage next week when they will take a long treck down to San Jose to face Bellarmine College Prep next Friday at 7 p.m. As for Acalanes, they’ll host Berkely next Friday night at 7 p.m.
