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Miscues cost Lions in season-opening loss

by Michael Dixon Correspondent

Football games are often not necessarily won by the team that makes the most good plays but can be lost by the team that makes the most costly mistakes. Unfortunately for Liberty’s football team, it found itself in the latter group in its season-opening game against Los Gatos on Friday, Sept. 3. As a result, the Lions lost 38-17.

Liberty was the better team for much of the first half and led 17-7 late in the second quarter. But with just over a minute to go in the half, the Lions lined up to punt. But the snap was low, and when the Lions punter fielded the ball with a knee already on the ground, the play was dead and the Cats had the ball on the 28 yard line. They capitalized, scoring a touchdown three plays later and went into halftime with a manageable 17-14 deficit.

Liberty coach Matt Hoefs had seen Los Gatos’ first game of the season, a 42-20 win over Monterey Trail. He knew that the Cats were likely to play a mistake-free game. So, following the error on the punt, when talking to the Lions at halftime, he preached the importance of not letting that mistake snowball.

“Even going into half, we said, ‘You played a great half of football. Don’t let the mistakes start to pile up because they’re not going to make them,’” Hoefs said.

Unfortunately for Liberty, the mistakes did pile up. As a result, the 17-14 halftime lead turned into a 31-17 third-quarter deficit.

Los Gatos received the second-half kickoff and tied the game with a field goal. Then, on the ensuing Lions possession, a pass from junior quarterback Nate Bell was deflected and intercepted. Two plays later, Los Gatos was in the end zone again, going up 24-17.

The Lions were forced to punt on their next possession and the play ended up being essentially an instant replay of the first botched punt attempt. Liberty’s punter dropped to a knee to field a low snap, causing the play to be whistled dead as soon as he caught the ball. The Cats again capitalized on the Lions’ miscue, scoring a touchdown to go up 31-17.

The Liberty offense couldn’t get going again. Los Gatos added a fourth-quarter touchdown for the game’s final score. The two punting miscues and the interception all gave the Cats possessions starting on the Liberty side of the field. The three touchdowns they scored on those ended up being the difference on the scoreboard.

“We preached all week that this is about as well of a coached team and program as there is out there and you can’t make these little mistakes,” Hoefs said. “We made a few. It took the momentum and swung it in their favor. I think that was the difference in the end.”

While the night didn’t end in the Lions’ favor, there were positives. Things looked bad early, when Liberty went three-and-out after receiving the opening kickoff and Los Gatos promptly opened up a 7-0 lead. But the Lions responded well, answering the touchdown immediately with one of their own when Bell found senior receiver Khiron Green for an 8-yard touchdown pass.

Junior kicker Dylan Clark nailed a 35yard field goal to put Liberty up 10-7. Then, after the teams exchanged punts, Bell and sophomore receiver Ryan Mckendry connected on a 68-yard touchdown pass.

“I thought Nate Bell did a lot to extend plays with his legs and I thought Ryan Mckendry, for a sophomore, had a really good first impression for his first game at receiver,” Hoefs said. “He had to have 100-plus yards. He looked good. There’s a lot of bright spots.”

With the loss, the Lions are 0-1. Next up for Liberty is the Honor Bowl and a game against Campolindo. Initially, the Lions were

Photo by Angelo Garcia Jr. Liberty’s Montez Woods, Mike Relei and Zay Reed converge on Los Gatos quarterback Jake Boyd during the Lions’ 38-17 loss to Los Gatos on Sept. 3.

see Liberty page 15

Heritage football team outlasts Granada in OT

Heritage junior running back Devon Rivers had already carried the ball 30 times on a Saturday afternoon with temperatures in the high 90s. But with the game on the line in triple overtime, it made sense that everyone in the stadium was expecting him to touch the ball at least a couple more times.

Instead, the Patriots slipped an inside handoff to senior fullback Tanner Smylie, who raced through the Granada defense for the goahead, 14-yard touchdown. The Heritage staff then used Rivers as a decoy once again on the two-point conversion, tossing the ball to him before he flipped it to junior Jeremiah Ruffin on a run-pass option reverse, and Ruffin carried the ball untouched into the end zone for an eight-point lead.

As they did all game, the host Matadors (0-2) did not go down without a fight, reaching the end zone on their possession in the third overtime. Needing the two-point conversion to tie and extend the game even further, however, Granada saw its attempt dashed when Heritage junior linebacker Brock Lombardi blitzed through the line and rushed the pass attempt to cause an incompletion and secure a wild 36-34 victory for the Patriots (1-1).

“We knew our young team had to grow up fast, but we also knew our returners had to lead us,” said Heritage coach Dave Fogelstrom. “Devon had a great game, but Tanner has been a twoway starter for us so we gave him a shot knowing they would be keying on Devon. Jeremiah is another returner, so we trusted him with the ball and he made the right decision to run it in.”

Making the final big play of the game, Lombardi epitomized the effort of a Heritage team, which lost 21 of 24 starters from its team that went 4-2 in the spring. The junior was banged up on multiple occasions, but didn’t let it stop him from finishing the game strong. He also had the game-tying score in the fourth quarter for the Patriots, which ultimately forced overtime.

“(Defensive coordinator) Arnold knew they were going to pass on the two-point conversion, so he sent Brock to break it up,” Fogelstrom said. “(Lombardi) is one tough, strong kid who we knew would give us everything he had to get there”

The game was back-and-forth from the beginning. Heritage struck first when Rivers took a screen pass from Jacob Wasso and raced 36 yards for the score. The extra point was wide right, allowing Granada to take a 7-6 lead following a methodical 70-yard drive on its

Liberty quarterback Nate Bell tries to elude Tate Schweitzer during the Lions loss.

Photo by Angelo Garcia Jr.

Liberty from page 14 going to take on Canyon Springs from North Las Vegas while Campolindo would have played Sutter Union earlier in the day. But on Friday morning, Sept. 3, the Honor Bowl announced on Twitter that both Canyon Springs and Sutter Union had to cancel due to “COVID and a tragic loss of life,” putting the disappointment of a loss in perspective.

With both of their opponents having to cancel, Liberty and Campolindo were quickly slotted into a game against each other. It will be played on Friday, Sept. 10 at 7:30 p.m.

“I think we kind of understand as a team now that we’ve got to take care of the little things during the week and make sure we have attention to detail with our game plans,” Hoefs said. “It translated into the second half when some attention to detail kind of slipped through the cracks.”

Another positive for Liberty in the loss to Los Gatos is just that the game was played at all. The Lions were initially set to begin their season against Bishop O’Dowd on Aug. 27 but that game was canceled due to poor air quality. So, the game against the Cats was not only Liberty’s first of the season, but -- because COVID-19 forced the 2020 season to be played in the spring of 2021 -- it was the school’s first football game during the traditional fall season in nearly two full years.

“Win, lose or draw, I’m happy we got this in,” Hoefs said. “All week I’ve been checking the AQI on my phone. Losing a football game isn’t the end of the world. We’ve got to pick ourselves up.”

To view a slideshow, visit www.thepress.

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Feeling golden

Photo courtesy of Rich Lopez

Rich “Thunder” Lopez of Brentwood and teammate John Sperling took home the gold medal at the Pickleball Tournament of Champions (TOC) last month in Brigham City, Utah. The team went undefeated in the men’s senior pros division, earning them first place. TOC is one of the biggest events in professional pickleball with a deep competitive field, and Lopez said he was honored to be a part of it. “It felt amazing to win,” said Lopez. “It was my first Tournament of Champions and it was a big field, and that made it a little more prestigious. I have won other golds, but they were small tournaments . . . this was a big one and we were playing top teams.”

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