On heels of dominant defensive effort and breakout performances by Sangiacomo and Logwood, Justin-Siena rolls Napa to get first-ever win at Memorial Stadium
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
While it may be hard to believe, Justin-Siena had never won at Memorial Stadium. Well, thanks to the Vine Valley Athletic League, the Braves can now check that box.
To make things even better, the Braves (5-2 overall, 2-1 VVAL) did it in grand fashion with a 34-0 victory over local rival Napa High.
“It’s obviously a big deal,” Justin-Siena sophomore quarterback Drew Sangiacomo said of the first win at Memorial Stadium. “This stadium means a lot to this whole town of Napa.”
Once again, making things easy was the defense for Justin-Siena. This was their fourth shutout of the season.
In the game, they held Napa to just 21 yards rushing and 68 passing. They also were able to get constant pressure on quarterback Yovanni Palma and even forced a fumble, and an interception.
“A lot of twists, a lot of stunts, a lot of pressures coming from same pressures, a lot of pressures coming from places people don’t expect,” Justin-Siena first-year head coach Tyler Streblow said of the defensive game plan. “Then, that’s on the kids to be able to learn the scheme and to be able to go out and execute it.”
Napa also only had two opportunities in the red zone, which they were unable to take advantage of.
On the offensive side of the ball, Sangiacomo and sophomore running back Dallas Logwood had their breakout games.
Logwood ended the night with 98 yards on the ground on 19 carries with two scores. His first game score came from a yard out with 45.8 left in the first quarter. Later, he put the game away with a 32-yard scamper that put the Braves up 27-0 with 2:32 left in the third quarter.
“It’s really just all my blockers,” Logwood said of his two scores. “I was following my blockers, get outside, run hard. The first touchdown, I just kept pushing.”
Meanwhile, Sangiacomo was quite efficient when it came to spreading the ball around to his weapons. He finished the night by completing 11 of 18 passes for 156 yards, and three touchdowns.
“He had a really good week of practice this last week,” Streblow said of the sophomore signal-caller, who is starting to put it all together. “I was starting to see some of the signs where I knew he was going to play well, and just some of the throws he made tonight in tighter windows, he wouldn’t have let that ball go the first couple week just because he was a little hesitant. Now, he’s letting it go. He’s ripping it in those windows.”
His first scoring connection was dished to Jason Gray for a 20-yard score with 5:58 left in the first half.
With just 18.6 left until halftime, Sangiacomo found Emrys Davies for a 35-yard score that made it 21-0 at the break.
Sangiacomo then found Ben Sebastiani for an 11-yard connection with 8:07 left in the game that made it 34-0.
One of the reasons he was able to get into a rhythm was due in large part that he’s finally starting to gain confidence and feel comfortable in the offense.
“Every week, it’s a huge game changer,” Sangiacomo explained. “I learned so much and every week I’m learning, and the game is getting slower. Everything’s getting slower. Practice feels more normal. It’s a lot better every week.”
Of course, it was pretty easy to put up points with the Braves’ defense holding down the fort and not allowing the Grizzlies (2-4 overall, 0-2 Vine Valley Athletic League) to get anything going offensively. After all, this is the third game where Justin-Siena has left with a donut on the board.
Luckily for the Braves, they can look to go for another win next week when they visit Vintage, also at Memorial Stadium. As for Napa, they will head to Petaluma next week for a matchup with Casa Grande.
In other VVAL games on Friday night, Vintage beat American Canyon 31-15 and there was no score reported from the Casa Grande-Sonoma Valley game. You can view the VVAL standings here.
