FOOTBALL: Falcons put streak to rest
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[For 33 games over a span of three-and-a-half seasons, Elverado-Trico's football program had gone without a victory heading into Friday night's 2011 opener with Christopher-Zeigler-Royalton, but finally the long wait for a win has come to an end.
With big interceptions from Dalton Porter and and Jacob Jeschke returned for touchdowns in the closing six minutes of play, the Falcons held on for a 28-13 home victory over C-Z-R, their first since 2007 and their first under new head coach Jim Hammers.
"What we were really trying to do there is get our best athletes and our fastest kids on the field," Hammers said of the late-game interceptions. "If something bad was going to happen, it was going to happen with our best kids out there and our fastest kids. When you've got athletes, it makes the game a lot easier, and we've got some."
One of those athletes is Porter, who stepped in front of a pass from C-Z-R's Tyler Atchison and took it 51 yards for a touchdown with just 5:15 left in the game to put E-T ahead 21-7. Porter had 50 yards on 6 carries as a running back in the game and also caught quarterback Alex McGill's only completion for 21 yards.
"I don't know what to say," said an exhausted, yet excited Porter. "Our defense stepped up and played their hearts out and didn't give up at all."
"It means a lot. People might not think so, but every year we have kids here that throw their heart out for this game right here and do anything for a win, and we finally got one."
Porter, a senior, has witnessed all the grief in the last three seasons without a victory, as has his teammate McGill, who made sure to give a shout-out to his defensive coordinator for making the big plays late in the game possible.
"That was all eleven guys on the field, and Coach Kirk being a heck of a defensive coordinator," said McGill. "We've been working for it for three years, to prove all those doubters wrong for once feels good."
Scott Marchetti racked up 127 yards on the ground for the Bearcats, but C-Z-R also had six turnovers, including a Marchetti fumble that set up McGill's one-yard score for a 6-0 lead with 7:53 to go in the first quarter.
After Marchetti's 3-yard run capped off a six-minute-plus drive to give C-Z-R a 7-6 lead, Bryce Mathis answered with a 10-yard scamper for six, then Porter took in the two-point conversion as Elverado-Trico led 14-7 at the half.
The Bearcats continued to move the ball in the second half, but the Falcons' defense was ready with a big play whenever they needed it, allowing only a kickoff return for a touchdown in the fourth quarter that had little impact on the final outcome.
"Christopher has a good football team," said Hammers. "They did a lot of things. In the second half they started throwing some screens, they were throwing the ball all over the place. I thought that they ran their wing T really good, they gave us a lot of trouble."
"Their size, they had so many big lineman that our kids really had to just gut it out and play low. The thing I think that really helped us is that we conditioned so hard, we've conditioned since June and I thought that was a big key in the ball game too."
Hammers didn't say a whole lot to his team following the win, electing rather to let them celebrate their hard-earned victory with the fans in attendance at EHS.
"I really wanted the fans to be able to celebrate with them," he said. "It was a moment where we can talk to them all we want, but that moment after the game, and all the fans that were there, I wanted them to enjoy this too. So really, I didn't say all that much afterwards. There's not much you need to say after a win like this. They just play their heart out, and they practice the same way."
"I had a plan and I have certain plays that I like to run, but these guys have bought into what we're trying to teach them and it's just a great thing for us to win a ball game after what they went through for three years. It's obviously a new season, but in the back of their minds it was still there. It's just heartwarming for me, it's unbelievable I'll tell ya."
The Falcons (1-0) go for win number two this Friday at Fairfield (7:00 p.m.).
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