The biggest factor of the Calistoga Wildcat run at its first undefeated regular season since 1987 was that they usually had the best running back on the field.
In the game for the NCL II/ Bay League championship that wasn’t the case.
Calistoga running back Dylan Alvardo is having a record year for Calistoga and on the surface his 27 carry 123 yard day isn’t a bad day. But for Alvardo it is his second worst day of the year and in a season he averaged over ten yards a carry, the St. Vincent defense held him to two runs of over ten yards on the day.
Meanwhile St. Vincent running back Derek Murphy had his biggest rushing day of the season, going for 189 yards and three first half touchdown in a 27-14 win. The win gives St. Vincent the NCL II/Bay League championship.
It is the second straight season the St. Vincent has tied for the league championship. Last season they lost the head to head tie-breaker to CSD of Fremont. This season they take the league championship with the win over Calistoga.
Murphy did most of his damage in the first half when he ran for his three touchdowns.
Calistoga took a 7-0 first quarter lead on a 7 yard run by Alvarado which was his 23rd rushing touchdown of the season.
After Murphy scored touchdown number one to cut the lead to 7-6, Austin Salizzoni intercepted his second pass of the season to give St. Vincent the ball deep in Calistoga territory. That set up Murphy’s second touchdown and gave St. Vincent the lead what turned out to be for good.
St. Vincent then came up with the big play of the game when Murphy went 44 yards for a score in the second quarter which gave them a 20-7 halftime lead.
Calistoga cut the lead to 20-14 in third, but St. Vincent regained the two touchdown lead with ten minutes left on a 33 yard touchdown pass from Jack Richardson to Patrick Garcia.
St. Vincent ends the regular season 7-2. The only other loss was to CSD-Fremont, the team they tied for the league title with last season.
Calistoga ends the regular season 8-1 and the realization that the only loss of the season, might cost them a first round NCS playoff game.
LONG DAY FOR SRJC
The No. 11 ranked team in the state played like the No. 1 team ranked team they were a month ago as San Francisco defeated No. 10 Santa Rosa 40-17.
The game wasn’t that close as San Francisco scored all of its points in the first half. Former Santa Rosa High standout Jahray Hayes rushed for 109 yards and two touchdowns. San Francisco also returned two interceptions for scores. Both of those came in the first minute of the second quarter to give San Francisco a 27-3 lead.
San Francisco remains one game behind No. 1 Butte. Butte prepared for that showdown with an 84-7 win over Foothill.
SRJC (6-3, 2-2) finishes its regular season next Saturday at San Mateo who is in a second place tie with San Francisco.
It wasn’t a good day for the SRJC Men basketball team either. Yes basketball has started and SRJC lost to Fresno 70-56 in the second round of the San Francisco tournament. They meet San Francisco in consolation game today.
COMING
On Monday we will have the NCS semi-final soccer schedule and a little recap of the round 2 games.
Also on Monday is the first official day of practice for the high school basketball season. We will post the YSN Pre-Season No. 1 Boys and Girls teams on our facebook page.
My email address is jacpasquini@comcast.net