Photos by RT Tolentino
Football:
Story by John Honell
Northview High School rode its defense and special teams all the way to its first CIF-SS football championship since 1987.
St. Anthony scored on its first drive of the game, once in the third quarter, and the boys from Long Beach got to within seven points after a 10-yard TD run with 48 seconds to play.
But as they’ve done throughout this postseason, the stingy Vikings’ defense not only made stops when they needed to, they also bought the offense enough time to find their stride.
And Northview was able to hold off the talented and explosive Saints, 27-20, in front of a standing-room-only crowd at Covina District Field.
“This has been a long time coming,” Vikings coach, and 1998 NHS grad, Marcel Perez, said. “Every kid on this team has missed at least one game, because of injury or COVID protocols, but they put in a lot of hard work and our kids played their butts off tonight. Our defense has been lights out all month and our offense is doing good. There is just no quit in our guys right now.”
The Vikings took a 27-14 lead with three minutes left in the game, when Joseph Gutierrez kicked a 31-yard field goal, but had to hang on as the Saints battled back.
St. Anthony went 75 yards in nine plays, aided by two major penalties, to close the gap to 27-20, when the extra-point attempt went wide.
Senior Destin Scurlock, part of the Vikings “good hands squad,” grabbed the on-side kick to not only secure the game, but the D-10 championship as well.
“We were trying to finish it at the end,” Perez said. “You have to give it to St. Anthony, they were tough all night and kept us in check. Those guys (Cheo Medina and Ronal Tebo, Jr.) got pounded, but they kept it going all night.”
The Saints scored first on a 68-yard pass from quarterback Conor Hochberg to wide receiver Kweku Claybrook, but the Vikings came right back to tie the score on a one-yard TD run by Tebo, which capped a 61-yard drive.
The key play on the drive was a 48-yard pass from James Arellanes to Medina.
Tebo carried the ball 16 times for 41 yards and two touchdowns.
“I took some beating tonight,” Tebo said. “But, it’s not something I’m not used to. We played our game and that was it. I’ve been waiting for this all my life. This this is the first championship I’ve ever won.”
Medina, who has been the Vikings leading rusher all year, added a touchdown on a 54-yard run with 7:21 left in the third quarter to build a 21-7 lead.
He finished the game with 114 yards on 18 carries.
“It was exciting to get loose for that run,” Medina said. “It was an amazing feeling, because I had to get that for my team. This win means everything to me. I’ve been waiting for this since the first of the year.”
Junior quarterback James Arellanes kept the Saints defense honest, completing 10 of 16 passes, including a flea-flicker early in the fourth quarter, for 121 yards.
“We worked on that flea flicker in practice a lot,” Arellanes said. “We were really happy it worked out. We had to work on our time a lot and Steven (Carlin) who caught the ball and flipped it to Cheo (Medina) did a really good job with it. I just had to do my job. I’ll give it to whoever can make a play, and I’m just happy we won.”
The Vikings defense caused two short punts, one for minus two yards, plus a bad snap on another fourth down play that gave them the ball at the Saints 19-yard line with 7:40 left in the game.
The Vikings ran the clock down on every snap, and took advantage of a pass interference penalty to keep the drive alive.
That ended with Gutierrez’ second field goal with three minutes left.
The Vikings should advance to the CIF State Finals next week with the site and an opponent to be determined by CIF.
Under the stats below is a video interview with Northview quarterback, James Arellanes.
Box Score:
SA: 7-0-7-6-(20)
N: 7-7-10-3-(27)
Scoring:
SA: Kweku Claybrook 68 pass from Conor Hochberg (kick good)
N: Ronal Tebo Jr 1 run (Joseph Gutierrez kick)
N: Ronal Tebo Jr 1 run (Joseph Gutierrez kick)
N: Cheo Medina 54 run (Joseph Gutierrez kick)
N: Joseph Gutierrez 25 FG
SA: Sone Aupiu 67 run (kick good)
N: Joseph Gutierrez 31 FG
SA: Conor Hochberg 10 run (kick failed)
Records: St. Anthony (9-5); Northview (8-6)
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