Braves start strong, but ultimately come up just short against Casa Grande
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
Sometimes history has a way of repeating itself.
In the inaugural Vine Valley Athletic League meeting last year Casa Grande-Petaluma edged Justin-Siena 36-35. This time, in the rematch the Gauchos were victorious again, but by a score of 41-34 over Justin-Siena.
Things looked promising early on for the Braves (4-1 overall, 0-1 VVAL) when they found the end zone on back-to-back drives in the first quarter. With 10:12 remaining in the quarter Hudson Beers connected with Miles Williams for an 86-yard touchdown pass. Later, with 4:19 remaining Beers found Solomone Anitoni for an 88-yard touchdown pass.
“You know, I think we have this bad habit of a lot of self-inflicted wounds and we got a couple of those,” Justin-Siena coach Brandon LaRocco said afterward, “and then, we let the momentum swing away from us.”
But from there, it was all Casa Grande (2-3, 1-0 VVAL). Their first score of the game came when Miguel Robinson found Dominic McHale for a 31-yard score with 1:09 left in the first quarter to make it 13-7.
Then in the second quarter, with 4:49 remaining they scored once on a Matt Hererra one-yard touchdown run. That sent the game into the break all tied at 13.
In the third quarter, the Gauchos kept their momentum going when Robinson found Rishad Nixon for an 86-yard touchdown with 5:30 left. Casa Grande jumped out to a two-score lead with 2:53 remaining when Dominic Giomi found the end zone from 18 yards out.
After a two-quarter hiatus, Justin-Siena found the end zone again with 11:28 remaining when Blake Hoban took a toss from Beers around the left edge for a one-yard run. They would score twice more in the quarter, both by way of junior running back Noah Young. The first would come when Young had a 59-yard touchdown run up the left sideline with 6:19 left in the contest. The other one would come with only 1:22 left when Young barged in for a six-yard run.
Young would end the night with 124 yards on 13 carries and two touchdowns.
“Yeah, it’s great to see him start using moves to evade tacklers as opposed to trying to run everybody over and I think he did a little bit of that tonight,” LaRocco said of his junior running back. “And that’s why I saw some of those bigger runs from him.”
Casa Grande would also notch two more scores in the final period. It was a case of Deja Vu when Robinson found Nixon, this time for a 56-yard touchdown connection with 11:18 left in the game. The final Gaucho score came with 9:13 remaining when Robertson kept it himself for a nine-yard touchdown.
Turnovers also hurt the Braves on the even, as they had three runovers that were all by way of the interception. But that’s also the price that comes with having a gunslinger type of quarterback. In the end, LaRocco wasn’t too mad about the Beers interceptions.
“It’s unrealistic to expect him to have zero interceptions all year,” he explained. “When you take shots, it’s gonna happen sometimes. Particularly when you’re behind and when you’re having to take a little bit more risk. You know, I thought he played really well.”
Beers ended the night with 318 yards passing while completing 17 of his 36 passing attempts. He also had three interceptions and two touchdown passes.
Both teams will continue VVAL play next week. Justin-Siena will visit Petaluma on Friday night at 7 p.m. As for Casa Grande, they will come back to Napa, this time for a meeting with defending league champion Vintage at 7 p.m. at Napa Memorial Stadium. It will be Vintage’s homecoming game and their league opener. Last year, Vintage cruised to a 44-0 victory over Casa Grande.
