SaberCats ousted from playoffs
Second-half turnovers, early deficit too much to overcome PUEBLO - A great amount of fight and grit wasn't quite enough to keep state championship hopes alive for the Fossil Ridge High School football team. The SaberCats battled to the final gun Saturday afternoon before falling to Pueblo County 36-26 in the Class 3A state quarterfinals at Hornets Stadium. Three second-half turnovers and an inability to slow down the Hornets' punishing running game combined to prevent Fossil Ridge from earning a date in the semifinals.
Despite falling in a 24-8 hole early in the second half, Fossil Ridge narrowed the deficit to 10 twice. But both times, Pueblo County answered with touchdowns to keep the SaberCats from gathering game-changing momentum.
"You keep trying, but kind of in the back of your mind, it seems hopeless. It wasn't," Fossil Ridge coach Clint Fick said. "I never felt our kids backed down."
Fossil Ridge, the sixth seed in the 3A field, ended its season at 9-3. No. 3 Pueblo County (11-1) advances to play No. 10 Berthoud (10-2) in the semifinals. Pueblo County's strong interior defense held Fossil Ridge to 105 yards rushing, which led to quarterback Brian Leistikow going primarily to the air. Leistikow went 12 for 29 for 215 yards passing with two touchdowns to Mike Lamb. The Hornets ran it a whopping 64 times for 322 yards, and backs Joe Pullara and Gio Rider combined for five touchdowns. "It was kind of hit-and-miss. We stopped them sometimes, and sometimes they had breaks," Fossil Ridge linebacker Greg Rushing said. "I thought we did a great job at gang-tackling and hitting them low, just not quite good enough." The 'Cats caught a tough break early after putting the Hornets in field-goal formation on fourth-and-eight. The Fossil Ridge sideline was flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct - the fourth dead-ball flag in five plays - which led to Pueblo County getting a new set of downs and scoring the opening touchdown. "We got called for saying something on the sideline, but it did not happen," Fick said. "Officials make mistakes but that one was unfortunate." Fossil Ridge answered with a mammoth 17-play drive that covered 93 yards, the last 10 on a strong scoring run by Lamb. But the Hornets then put together a 14-play scoring drive of their own for a 16-8 halftime lead. The SaberCats made a key mistake to open the second half when Leistikow lost a fumble. It led to another Pueblo County touchdown and a 24-8 lead. Leistikow ushered quick-strike scores on two of the next three possessions, a 41-yard touchdown run and a 46-yard scoring pass off a nice misdirection-based screen play. The problem was Pueblo County answered each time with short touchdown runs by Pullara. With 7:10 to play, the turnover bug hit again, giving Pueblo County free possessions to run more time off the clock. Leistikow hung a couple passes and was picked off twice by cornerback Marshall Stout. "We were down and needed quick scores, and I guess the passing game is where you do it," Leistikow said. "Turnovers killed us. That's what brought us down and really hurt us." Leistikow gave it one last run, hitting Lamb with a 58-yard touchdown pass, but the SaberCats failed on all three two-point conversion attempts in the second half and still trailed by two scores. Pueblo County recovered a pair of onside kicks to further stymie Fossil Ridge's comeback bid. "If we made that two-point conversion, we move within one score with 1½ minutes left and if we could have executed the onside, we still had a chance," Fick said. "They did a great job. The kids never quit."
posted by WestEnd @ Sunday, November 18, 2007
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Hornets prevail
Next stop for Pueblo County is a 3A semifinal matchup at Berthoud.
By TOM PURFIELD
THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN
It may not have been very pretty, but the bottom line is the Pueblo County High School football team is one win away from returning to the state championship game.
The Hornets ran with power and toughness Saturday to hold off feisty Fossil Ridge 36-26 in the Class 3A state quarterfinals at Hornets Stadium. Pueblo County was burned on a bunch of big plays that kept the SaberCats in the game, but at the same time, always had an answer.
"Just getting the win feels fantastic. We're one step closer to where we need to be," Pueblo County coach Jeff Wilson said. "Offensively, we played great; defensively, we need to get a lot better."
Pueblo County, runner-up in 3A last year, improved to 11-1 and will hit the road for the first time this postseason next Saturday to face Berthoud (10-2), a 28-17 winner over Sterling. Fossil Ridge's season ended at 9-3.
In a stop-and-go game that seemed to lack flair and flow, the Hornets were able to counter the SaberCats' quick-strike offense with a thunderous ground game. Led by Joe Pullara (120 yards rushing, three touchdowns) and Gio Rider (95 yards, two touchdowns), the Hornets pounded out 322 rushing yards on 64 carries.
Cornerback Marshall Stout had two interceptions and picked off another pass on an attempted two-point conversion. The Hornets' pass defense was on the hot seat after Fossil Ridge's double-wing ground game was stymied by Pueblo County's physical defense up front.
SaberCats quarterback Brian Leistikow passed for 215 yards and two touchdowns, but also committed three turnovers. Fossil Ridge went aerial after managing just 56 yards rushing in the first half.
"When we got two scores behind, we had to get involved in some things we don't normally do, but we moved the ball really well in our spread formation," Fossil Ridge coach Clint Fick said. "They're really the first team all year that punished us up front. That's a very, very good football team and it's going to take a very good team to beat them."
The referees were the show early, tossing dead-ball flags everywhere. One was an unsportsmanlike penalty on the Fossil Ridge sideline that took the Hornets out of field goal formation on fourth-and-eight to a fourth-and one. Pueblo County picked up the first down and scored on Rider's 4-yard run for an 8-0 lead.
The SaberCats answered in earnest with a 17-play drive that covered 93 yards. Mike Lamb dragged Zach Sandoval and J.T. Greenhood into the end zone on a spinning, churning 10-yard run to tie the game.
Pueblo County came back with a monster drive of its own, going 70 yards on 14 plays. Rider went off left end and cruised to a 5-yard score for a 16-8 lead that held up to halftime.
"That's important to do. When you get hit, you've got to hit back and we did," Wilson said. "Offensively, it made it really nice, being able to control the clock. They had a hard time stopping a good thing."
The Hornets got some separation early in the second half, capitalizing on a fumble by Leistikow on the opening drive. After chopping off chunks of yards at a time, Pullara bulled over center Kyle Houston from the 1 to make it 24-8.
"We kind of just came together more as one unit," Houston said of the offensive line. "As soon as we didn't have any holes in our front line, we started to roll."
Leistikow made up for the fumble in a hurry with a zig-zag 41-yard touchdown run to bring the SaberCats within 10. But after the teams exchanged punts, Pueblo County struck again on a 3-yard run by Pullara.
On the next play from scrimmage, Leistikow sold a play left and threw a screen pass right to Mike Lamb, who raced 46 yards for a touchdown. Pullara was just heating up, however, with a 39-yard run to set up his third touchdown for the Hornets' final score.
"It was pretty much just what we've been doing all season, get 3 yards at a time and anything more, we're happy," Pullara said. "They were getting a lot of guys in the box, but our linemen came through and had a real good game blocking and made holes for us."
Leistikow was going to the air almost exclusively with 7:10 to play and Stout began measuring his passes. On consecutive possessions, Stout fought off the receiver on floated passes and picked off Leistikow.
"We just bore down mentally. We knew they were going to throw it," said Stout, who now has 10 interceptions on the season. "Coach (Marvin) Brown and coach Wilson have taught us a lot. I owe a lot to them."
Leistikow struck again with a 58-yard bomb to Lamb with 1:17 on the clock, but failed PATs on all three second-half scores and Pueblo County's recovery of two onside kicks rendered it too little, too late.
But the SaberCats' ability to hurt the Hornets quickly had Wilson concerned.
"We kept letting them back in it. We just give up the big plays, so we've got to stop that," Wilson said. "That's going to be a point of emphasis this week, doing what you're supposed to do, not what you think you ought to do."
Pueblo County 36, Fossil Ridge 26
Class 3A quarterfinals
F.Ridge 0 8 6 12 - 26
P.County 8 8 8 12 - 38
SCORING
P-Gio Rider 3 run (Myles Meserve pass from J.T. Greenhood)
F-Mike Lamb 10 run (Brad Ballinger run)
P-Rider 5 run (Meserve pass from Greenhood)
P-Joe Pullara 1 run (Brett Avila run)
F-Brian Leistikow 41 run (run failed)
P-Pullara 3 run (kick failed)
F-Lamb 46 pass from Leistikow (pass failed)
P-Pullara 10 run (run failed)
F-Lamb 58 pass from Leistikow (run failed)
TEAM STATISTICS
F.Ridge P.Cty
First downs 13 18
Rushes-yards 27-105 64-322
Passing yards 215 10
Comp-Att-Int 11-28-2 1-2-1
Punts 2-24.0 4-30.5
Fumbles-Lost 5-1 0-0
Penalties-Yards 7-50 8-65
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING-Fossil Ridge: Lamb 6-27, TD, Leistikow 9-40, TD, Ballinger 8-18, Adam Follett 2-6, Sean Romero 1-2, Shawn Salisbury 1-12; Pueblo County: Pullara 22-120, 3TDs, Rider 20-95, 2TDs, J.T. Greenhood 6-26, Josh Greenhood 9-40, Avila 7-41.
PASSING-Fossil Ridge: Leistikow 12-29-2, 215 yards, 2TDs; Pueblo County: J.T. Greenhood 1-2-1, 10 yards.
RECEIVING-Fossil Ridge: Lamb 3-118, 2TDs, Landon Ochwat 5-63, Nick Moore 1-4, Hayden Rowley 1-7, Ballinger 1-0, Follett 1-23; Pueblo County: Avila 1-10.
A-4,000 (estimated).
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