Saints race past White Pine
Mike Valenzeula was in a comfortable position Saturday afternoon at Mountain View as his Saints left the field for halftime.
The first-year coach had just witnessed his team, which led 41-0 over White Pine, rush for 293 yards on the backs of juniors Matthew Larson and Jacob Duldulao.
So when Mountain View completed the 48-0 rout of the Bobcats, Valenzuela was searching for the right words to describe his pleasant predicament.
“The challenge is to keep one of them fresh,” Valenzeula said. “When they’re both hot it’s fun. Having them both be a part of what we’re doing is the challenge. It’s entirely the credit of the offensive line. I could have had 150 yards behind that line.”
The Saints (5-1, 5-0 Division III Southern) scrambled for 395 total rushing yards, scoring on their first six possessions, as they extended their winning streak to five games.
Larson, who had 177 yards on 11 carries, found the end zone twice in the first half on aggressive, tackle-breaking runs of 67 and 46 yards. The running back complied 154 of his total rushing yards in the first half, and hauled in a 26-yard touchdown pass from Travis Wallace early in the first.
“We executed our plays correctly and we had good blocking on the line,” said Larson. “We also had good perimeter blocking with our receivers to open up the run. There were a lot of blocks and wide-open holes.”
Larson and Duldulao found those holes and executed the entire afternoon.
Duldulao racked up 129 rushing yards on eight carries, scoring on first-half runs of 53 and 11 yards. Defensively, he intercepted a pass which set up Larson’s first scoring run.
“Our kids were well prepared on both sides of the ball,” Valenzuela said. “We came out in an aggressive fashion, running downhill. We got our big kids a lot of touches early and that set the tone for us.”
Senior Ian Locke capped Mountain View’s offensive outburst with an 18-yard TD pass to Nick Jenkins late in the second quarter and a 2-yard scoring dash in the third.
The defending Southern League champion Bobcats (2-3, 1-3) had four turnovers and failed to discover any sort of rhythm. They were led by senior running back Ben Miller, who had 39 yards on five carries.
“We’re done with moral victories,” Valenzuela said of the importance of defeating league foes. “We’re trying to come in prepared week-after-week. This is a totally different White Pine team than last year.
There’s no vengeance in this victory. There’s no payback. We just saw what they did on film and we tried to make adjustments, and it worked out well.”
