Santa Ynez football returned the opening kickoff of the season for a touchdown and never looked back en route to a 43-22 victory over Dos Pueblos in Friday’s opener at Scott O’Leary Stadium.
The Pirates took advantage of the Chargers’ inexperience on the offensive end, forcing seven turnovers in a marathon of a season opener that lasted three hours.
“From my perspective, it was execution issues,” Dos Pueblos head coach AJ Pateras said. “Turnovers and fumbles (offensively)… Defensively, it was penalties and then just leveraged assignments or blown coverage.
“For me, I look at it as a big picture. First game, a lot better than we were a year ago. We’re replacing key guys, a lot of guys shined, and a lot of guys showed they need to continue to get better in practice.”
The Chargers launched the opening kickoff to Santa Ynez’s Greyson Foy, who hauled in the kick at the 10-yard line and took off down the right sideline for a 90-yard touchdown return and an early 7-0 lead.
“We kind of felt that if we took the ball and we could get an explosive play, I didn’t know we’d return a kickoff, but we felt with our returning quarterback on our offense, we could get a score on the first drive,” Santa Ynez head coach Josh McClurg said.
“We felt starting off early with a team that has a young or inexperienced quarterback, they kind of tend to press when that happens. So that’s the position I wanted to put us in.”
The Santa Ynez defense then stuffed the Chargers at midfield for a turnover on downs, and the offense responded with an 11-play drive capped off by a 13-yard rushing touchdown from quarterback Jude Pritchard to double the lead to 14-0 with 6:15 left in the first.
The Pirates continued to roll in the opening quarter, forcing a DP punt before putting together another scoring drive, this one ending in a 16-yard touchdown scramble from Ayden Finley to make it 21-0.
The Charger offense continued to struggle on the ensuing drive, losing a fumble to give Santa Ynez another drive beginning in Dos Pueblos territory. The Pirates capitalized with a 36-yard field goal by Diego Pulido to extend the lead to 24-0 early in the second quarter.
Dos Pueblos had its first big play of the day on its next drive thanks to a 57-yard rush by Callan Lee. However, the Chargers promptly fumbled the next handoff to give the ball back to the Pirates.
“Offensively, the things were there, but we can’t put the ball on the ground. We can’t have mesh issues. We can’t have drop passes,” Pateras said. “We played a good opponent. We know what that opponent’s going to bring and we just didn’t rise to it.”
Santa Ynez then fumbled on its next drive and Dos Pueblos’ Andrew Cook came up with the recovery. However, once again, the Chargers turned the ball over via an interception by Santa Ynez’s Luc Lewis.
This time, the Pirates turned the interception into points as Foy punched in a 4-yard touchdown rush to bring the lead to 31-0 with 4:12 left in the half.
“This is one of the longest games ever. I mean, it was just a sloppy game, from penalties to out of bounds, dropped balls, interceptions, change of possession, just sloppy,” Pateras said.
“I think it’s just more of a lack of focus, a lack of attention to detail. When you’re tired, and when you get a strain on you, you’ve got to be a little bit more focused. Those are things we’ve been working on, those are things that these young guys are going to improve.”
With one minute left in the half, the Chargers tipped a Santa Ynez pass at the line of scrimmage and Finn Mcweeney came up with the interception from the defensive line to give his team strong field possession.
The DP offense then found the endzone for the first time this season as Diego Chamu barreled his way in for a 4-yard rushing touchdown to cut the deficit to 31-7 at halftime.
The third period was a more balanced matchup as the two sides traded failed possessions until the Pirates broke through with 26 seconds left in the quarter on a 9-yard rushing touchdown by Pritchard to extend the lead to 37-7.
“We played defense for three and a half quarters and they played really well, kept us in the game,” Pateras said. “I mean, that could have gotten off the rails and it was competitive for us in terms of getting reps.”
The Chargers then put together one of their stronger runs of the night early in the fourth quarter, ending with a 37-yard field goal off the foot of Seth Orozco to make it 37-10 with 8:29 left in the game.
The DP defense carried that momentum over to the next possession, forcing a three-and-out. The Pirates then fumbled the snap on the punt attempt, giving the Chargers the ball inside the Santa Ynez 10-yard line.
They took advantage of the field position as Micah Barnhart snuck into the endzone on a 2-yard rushing touchdown to make it 37-16.
The two sides exchanged touchdowns in the final three minutes of play as Santa Ynez’s Austin Willis scored on a 25-yard rushing touchdown and Dos Pueblos’ Grady Felix and Soren Smedley connected for a 20-yard touchdown pass to bring the game to its final score of 43-22.
While the season-opening loss is not what the Chargers hoped for, Pateras is confident in his team’s ability to turn things around and improve as Tri-County League play grows nearer.
“I think we’re going to get there. We’ve got a lot of seniors, we’ve got a lot of leadership. We’ve got a lot of guys that are learning how to be leaders, too,” Pateras said. “This is the first year where we haven’t had to bring up young guys and throw them to the wolves. This is the first time we’ve had a class all the way through and really haven’t had a chance to lead because we had great leaders
“I’m pretty positive we’re gonna be good down the line, and we’re going to figure it out as we go, and guys are going to get opportunities to showcase it.”
Dos Pueblos will look to bounce back at home next week against Royal High on Friday at 7 p.m. at Scott O’Leary Stadium.