Williams late score pushes Justin-Siena past Middletown and into CIF North Coast Section semifinals for fourth time in five years
By Kyle Foster, photo courtesy of Eric Thompson (Shamboozled.com)
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
The old saying goes that nothing is easy in football or in the playoffs. Man, is this a true sentiment these days?
It also helps when you get a style clash that spices things up even more. You can use any analogy you want but in Friday night’s CIF North Coast Section Division 6 quarterfinal, every inch was earned and hard to come by.
When the final quarter ended, it was the No. 3 seed of Justin-Siena who outslugged No. 6 seeded Middletown to win 7-0 and advance to next week’s semifinals.
Justin-Siena (6-5) once again had to lean heavily on their stout defense when it mattered most. All night long, they made vital play after essential play to give the Braves a chance to win.
The Mustangs (5-6) drove down into the red zone multiple times in the contest. However, each time they were denied in many different ways. You couldn’t script all the different ways they didn’t score.
In the first quarter, they were able to make it down to the Braves 26 where it was 4th down and 1. Justin-Siena sniffed out a run up the middle to turn the ball over on downs. The Braves also won the turnover battle quite handily by picking off Middletown quarterback Hunter Hartzog three times.
“We were just playing our game and we were just making sure that if we stopped the run game, then they can’t pass,” Justin-Siena senior Roman Williams said of the defensive effort. “That was just our whole thing was making sure we stopped the run. No matter how tired we are, no matter how beat up we are, we just know we got to stick as a team and just stop them.”
One of the interceptions could’ve been a 101-yard pick-six by Cameron Powell but was brought back due to a blindside block and sideline warning penalties, which forced Justin-Siena to start the drive on their own 10.
The Braves also stopped the Mustang run game in the second half after getting beat on the ground in the first half. Early on, Middletown was using stretch, dive, and a few inside runs plays to get whatever yardage they wanted. When it was all over, they allowed just 110 yards on the ground.
“We were just I think out of focus in the first half,” Williams said of the yards allowed on the ground in the first half. “Our talk in the weight room during the half just really brought us all together and we all focused up. We all focused on making sure we did our job so we could stop them.”
Though Justin-Siena scored just once, they were able to move the ball from title-to-time with many drives stalling out in the end. Leading the Braves’ offensive effort was Joaiyah Madddalone who had 7 receptions for 96 yards. Maddalone was used on swing passes and over the middle to keep the Mustangs honest.
“They were starting to stack the box there a little bit and we just kind of had to take the quick throws to the flat,” Justin-Siena first-year head coach and offensive coordinator Tyler Streblow said of the Maddalone who was their most productive receiver in the game. “That was a bad coaching job early. I took a couple of shots downfield and it wasn’t there. At halftime, we went in and said we’ve just got to hit Jojo on the bubbls, on the hutches, and the quick swings, little things like that and he’s just a playmaker. So we’re just trying to get him the ball.”
Because of that, it opened up running room for Williams who opened things up when it mattered most. He carried the ball 17 times for 89 yards.
Running lanes finally opened up for Williams late in the game where he started to get his most productive rushes of the game. He put an exclamation point on his solid night by forcing his way into the end zone with just 34.2 left to give his team their only lead of the night.
“We were planning on running two plays,” Williams said of the final sequence. “We were supposed to do one, get close, and then just punch it in. But I saw the play and I was like ‘I gotta get in, I gotta get in, I gotta make sure I end it now.’ So that way we don’t have to worry about if we’re going to get it on the second one. So I saw the touchdown, I saw it was in five yards and I was like ‘yeah, I can get there. What made it even better was as I was getting in my back was faced towards the end zone, and I just felt my teammates come in and push me in. I was very proud of my team for doing that because we never talked about doing that. So I gotta give that one to my teammates.”
The win means Justin-Siena will be back at home next Friday night when they’ll face No. 7 seed Salesian College Prep who beat No. 2 Moreau Catholic of Hayward 14-10. You can view the updated CIF NCS Divison 6 bracket here.
Last year, Salesian beat Justin-Siena 28-26 in the CIF NCS Division 6 title game. It will be a chance for the Braves to get revenge less than a year later. The game will start at 7 pm.
