Behind Wyatt-Williams, No. 2-seeded Toreadores grind out 42-28
victory over No. 7 Live Oak in first round of CCS Division III
playoffs
MONTEREY
The Live Oak Acorns waited a year for the opportunity to invade the coast again and turn the Division III football playoffs upside down. For six-and-a-half minutes Friday, it was theirs for the taking.
Artie Valencia threw to Jacob Montoya for a 45-yard gain on a trick play to start the game. Blair Zerr caught a play-action pass from Dominic Bejarano near the sideline then turned upfield for a 44-yard score. John Wyatt-Williams, Monterey County’s all-time single-season rushing leader, couldn’t wiggle free or find room to run against the Acorns’ defense.
It was Live Oak 14, Monterey 0 with 5:29 left in the first quarter, and anything seemed possible for the seventh-seeded Acorns.
It is that way now only for Monterey. Wyatt-Williams was at full steam midway through the first half, and the 17th-ranked Toreadores rode the stocky senior to a grinding 42-28 victory that, for the second straight season, ended Live Oak’s bid for resurgence in the opening round of this Central Coast Section tournament.
“It came down to their size,” Acorns coach Jon Michael Porras said. “They were bigger, stronger and more physical than us. The kids fought hard, but there’s only so much you can do against size. They have huge tackles. And (Wyatt-Williams), it took everyone we had to bring him down.”
It was similar to last year, when Live Oak opened up a three-touchdown lead over top seed Terra Nova only to collapse in the fourth quarter.
The Acorns (5-6 overall) provided enough theatrics to make the showdown between former league rivals interesting inside frosty Monterey Peninsula College Community Stadium. But they merely shook awake the giant No. 2 seed.
“We were a little overconfident. You could see it in the kids,” Monterey coach Tom Newton said. “They found out fast that this is the playoffs. Every week’s gong to be a battle.”
The Toreadores (10-1) were off and running once Wyatt-Williams broke lose almost untouched for a 64-yard touchdown run that pushed his team ahead, 21-14, for good going into halftime. The 5-foot-9 powerback gained 232 yards in 30 carries, eclipsing the 2,000-yard mark, but his supporting cast carried the Monterey Bay League champions early on.
After Live Oak turned the ball over on downs at its 35-yard line, quarterback Stephen Ventimilia scored on his first of three bootleg-touchdown runs from 12 yards out to tie the game 14-all, and Kyle Mills plowed into the end zone on a 14-yard power and picked off Dominic Bejarano’s pass at Monterey’s 36, setting up Wyatt-Williams’ long touchdown run.
The Acorns’ offense, which performed beautifully at times with play-action passes and solid runs by seniors Cody Van Aken, Zerr and freshman Trevor Bearden, slowly lost momentum.
Live Oak’s defense could not hold. The Toreadores scored on six of their last eight drives, not counting the final kneel down.
“Their linemen were really big. They were able to get their hands on us,” Acorns linebacker T.J. Ornduff said, referring to Monterey’s 280-plus pound tackles Jasper Tamiano and Dontrae Jackson. “Whenever we got to (Wyatt-Williams), we stopped him.”
But that was typically after 4 or 5 yards. With Live Oak forced to key on Williams, the Toreadores dialed up open runs for Ventimilia and Mills, who rushed for 77 yards and three touchdowns.
Ventimilia walked into the end zone on a 23-yard naked bootleg to cap Monterey’s first drive of the second half and scored the clinching touchdown on a 3-yard sweep with 2:23 remaining.
“Their were a lot of opportunities,” said the senior who will play baseball for Hawaii next year.
Ventimilia rushed for 43 yards and threw for 98 in 5-of-12 passing. On defense, he returned a fumble 31 yards to set up his 6-yard touchdown strike to Cameron Strickland in the left corner of the end zone. That pushed the Toreadores’ lead to 35-14 with 9:34 left in the third quarter.
Save for a fumbled pitch and an interception, Bejarano was equally impressive. The senior completed 5 of 5 in the second half and threw for 133 yards and two touchdowns.
“Dominic had an amazing game. He made great reads and showed a lot of heart,” said Van Aken, who rushed for 46 yards and a 10-yard score after Valencia’s pass to Montoya.
“Our mistakes brought us down, but we played hard the whole night.”
That they did. After starving through the middle quarters, the Acorns needed three plays to make it a two-score game again; Valencia gained 13 yards on a pass from Bejarano and scored on a 21-yard reverse. Live Oak trailed 35-21 with 8:19 remaining.
“We just kept fighting, fighting for another game,” Valencia said after totaling 75 yards in his prep finale.
The Acorns reached the end zone on their final drive, another three-play series. Bejarano connected with Van Aken for 41 yards, then hit Montoya for a 6-yard gain and a 10-yard score, giving the senior wideout 61 receiving yards.
But with 1:29 showing on the clock, disappointment was imminent.
“We had so much potential this year. This was still the best team I’ve ever played on,” Ornduff said. “We were a championship-caliber team. Even when we got blown out (in Mount Hamilton Division play), you’d see guys still fighting, never giving up.”
Acorns linebacker Nikki Weber, who missed most of his senior season with injury, was proud of the effort he saw.
“They played harder than they’ve ever played,” he said.
Porras felt similarly. It took a hard-nosed effort, three trick plays — Live Oak converted on a fake punt in the second quarter — and several tries on fourth down for his team to have a shot at an upset.
“We had to come out fast and put some points on the board,” the fourth-year coach said.
“I think it was a successful end to the season. We probably could have been a little better, but we got here. We made the playoffs for the third time in four seasons. Not too many teams in CCS can say that.”
That the Acorns made it this far was a minor miracle. After finishing 3-4 in the premiere Blossom Valley Athletic League A conference, Live Oak needed five teams to lose their final regular-season games to advance.
“When they had everything going, they were a pretty good football team,” said Newton, whose team plays No. 3 North Monterey County in the semifinals this week.
Trailing by two touchdowns with about three minutes left, the Acorns nearly stopped the Toreadores on four plays inside the Live Oak 3 to keep hope alive. But Ventimilia iced it on a snaky fourth-and-goal keeper from the 2 just as rain began to fall like a curtain.
While the Toreadores celebrated with fans, several Live Oak defenders laid sprawled out face down in the end zone.
It was over.
