La Quinta celebrates Thursday’s CIF playoff victory over Saddleback. (PHOTOS: Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone).
La Quinta High School’s football team had some bumps along the road Thursday night but finished strong to defeat Saddleback 21-20 in a CIF Division 14 playoff opening round game at Garden Grove.
The Aztecs registered their first CIF playoff victory since 2017 and first for Coach James Stewart. The Aztecs (8-3) moved on to the second round next week at home vs. Pioneer.
Senior running back Cooper Starnes scored on a 18-yard TD with 45 seconds left in the game to put La Quinta ahead 21-20,
Starnes led La Quinta rushing for 166 yards on 24 carries. Teammate Michael Palacios rushed for 127 yards on 16 carries and scored two touchdowns.
La Quinta struggled with nearly 100 yards in penalties, a fumble and some special teams breakdowns, but came through when it counted.
“That touchdown was probably the most powerful team effort we’ve had all season,” Starnes said. “No one wanted to lose, we had so many mess-ups through the whole game, but when it came down to that last drive and we were down, we knew what we had to do and the whole team executed it well. It was a roller coaster, but I never lost hope.”
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Saddleback, which was making its first appearance in the playoffs since 2015, was without starting junior quarterback Andre Scott, who was ejected for unsportsmanlike conduct and sat out the second half of last week’s league game with Magnolia and was required to miss Thursday’s game, according to Roadrunners coach Rob Thompson.
Backup quarterback Joseph Torres, normally a running back and linebacker, tried to fill the void with a last minute comeback.
He connected with Andrew Alvarez on a 55-yard pass play giving Saddleback possession at the 28. But Torres was sacked for a loss on the final play and with no timeouts left, Saddleback was unable to get in position for a possible game-winning field goal as time expired.
Saddleback (6-5) thrilled its fans cheering on the team when Anthony Lopez scored on a 45-yard TD run with 2:37 remaining. But the Roadrunners were flagged three times on the ensuing kick-off and eventually La Quinta took over with excellent field position on its own 45-yard line.
“I’m so excited, we’re just going to keep working and keep playing and keep grinding,” said La Quinta Coach James Stewart. “Believe it or not, that is my first playoff win as La Quinta’s coach in 13 years. We went 0-27 until I won my first game.”
It was a bitter loss for the Saddleback players, who a week ago celebrated an outright Zeta League title.
“First I want to say how proud I am of these kids,” Thompson said. “We talk about win or lose, just leave it out on the field and they certainly did tonight without question. I want to thank my coaching staff, they did a great job and the kids. We always say, ‘we have a program now, not just a team,’ we’re a football program now so we’re going to build on this.
“Obviously it hurt not having our quarterback tonight, that hurt us big time. It really limited our offense so we did what we could. May have probably made a couple questionable calls on special teams with the PATs. We missed the one on a bad snap, and then I tried to chase points and go for two and didn’t get it.”
Thompson said he was hoping to get in position for the field goal in the final seconds.
“Our field goal kicker could have made it, he makes 45-yard field goals all the time, but we shouldn’t have to rely on a game-winning field goal,” he said.
“My hats off to La Quinta, that number eight (Starnes) is a heck of a player, we knew that coming in, we thought we had a good game plan to stop him, but he’s just a great athlete.”
Torres completed three of nine passes for 140 yards. Lopez rushed for 143 yards on 11 carries and Bravo had 69 yards on 18 carries. Alvarez had two catches for 123 yards.
La Quinta jumped out to a 14-6 halftime lead. Palacios scored on a 21-yard TD run and caught a 20-yard TD pass from starting quarterback Jakson Clark, who left the game in the second half with an injury and was replaced by Joshua Noguera.
Torres had a 1-yard TD run for the Roadrunners in the second quarter, but Saddleback missed the point after.
Saddleback cut the lead to 14-12 on a 38-yard TD run by Fabian Bravo with 3:59 left in the third quarter but was unable to convert the two-point conversion.
In the end, it was Starnes who led the way for La Quinta.
“He’s an amazing football player, nobody has really seen him, he went both ways tonight, playing corner, we put him on the best receiver, he’s a stud and I was telling my OC (offensive coordinator), I don’t care if it’s third and 8, give him the ball,” Stewart said.
—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com
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