When scheduling an opponent for Homecoming games, it is common to seek a school that will put up a good fight but fall rather easily, leaving returning alumni and other fans departing with smiles on their faces.
On this year’s Pointer schedule, Hoover filled the Homecoming slot, and the Cardinals would appear, at first glance, to be a school who might spoil the PLHS festivities. After all, the Cardinals compiled a 10-3 record last year, shutting out five teams along the way.
They even fought all the way to the CIF Div. III finals before losing a 21-9 heartbreaker to La Costa Canyon after leading 9-7 during the fourth quarter.
How quickly fortunes can change.
Hoover lost a remarkable 12 all-league players to graduation, and the 2015 squad is struggling, entering the contest with a 2-3 mark.
The result?
The Pointers scored on their first play from scrimmage and on every first-half possession, scoring 56 points in the first half and delivering a crushing 56-27 knockout punch to the reeling Cardinals before an overflow crowd at Pete Ross Stadium.
The Pointers’ record moves to 4-2 entering Western League play.
With the hosts holding a 43-point lead at intermission, the second half was played with a running clock, stopped only for timeouts or injuries. As backup players saw significant action, the Cardinals scored twice more, making the final result look somewhat respectable.
Only 11 seconds elapsed in the game before the Pointers scored, Jaylen Griffin taking the handoff on his team’s first play and racing 65 yards for the 7-0 lead.
Griffin’s second score came three minutes later on a 30-yard dash up the middle.
The Cardinals then struck, as quarterback Daevon Bazzo, a former Pointer who transferred to Hoover, unleashed a beautifully thrown pass, hitting his receiver in stride on a play that covered 85 yards to draw within eight at 14-6.
But the Pointer onslaught continued, quarterback Brenden Torrence taking a keeper up the middle and Tshombré Carter scoring on a short dive sandwiched around an 80-yard touchdown scamper by the Cardinals, upping the Pointer lead to 28-13.
Following a second quarter interception by sophomore Nashom Carter, the Pointers scored quickly and added another score on their next drive before an interception and long return by sophomore Bariza Sunday Kennedy ended at the Cardinals’ 1-yard line. The Dogs scored on the next play for the 56-13 advantage at the break.
In just 24 minutes of play, the teams combined for 69 points and hundreds of yards in offense.
The Cardinals added two scores in the shortened second half, one that came after Pointer defenders chased a scrambling Bazzo all around the backfield before he found a wide-open receiver at the Pointer 1-yard line.
The Pointers are up against a major test tomorrow afternoon, Oct. 16, as powerful Madison visits Bennie Edens Field. The Warhawks have been in the Pointers’ crosshairs since they inflicted two losses on the Dogs in a three-week span last year. The first (36-14) was for the Western League title, and the second (49-28) eliminated the Pointers from CIF Div. I playoffs. Both games were played at Madison.
The Warhawks went on to the Div. I championship game before losing a hard-fought 49-42 decision to St. Augustine.
Madison comes into this year’s game with a 4-2 record, averaging 44.5 points scored per game.
Kickoff is at 3 p.m. in a game honoring Point Loma cluster school students and youth football players. Extra points: PLHS students elected Homecoming King Tyler Mullen and Queen Keala Johnson. MacKenzie Batliner sang the National Anthem before kickoff. Wise words: Chargers defender Jimmy Wilson, a Pointer alum, attended the game and, while watching from the sidelines with his wife, reacted when he spotted a young Pointer defender sulking by himself after getting beat on a long Hoover touchdown pass. Wilson approached the sophomore and told him calmly, “Everyone gets beat, so get over it, shake it off and go stand with your teammates,” which the player did. Late in the fourth quarter, with the blowout at 56-19, a group of Pointer students began the “I believe that we will win!” chant popularized at SDSU basketball games. “Sounds like the advanced math class showed up for Homecoming,” said a sideline media joker. Installation of long-awaited night lighting, the first phase of planned stadium improvements, should begin in time to make this the last Pointer Homecoming game requiring rented lighting and the fumes that come from nearly 20 generators running for hours.