Viva Gradilla! Whittier Christian HC Sergio Gradilla and Grant Escobar celebrate Friday night's win over Maranatha.
(Pasadena)- Whittier Christian’s Grant Escobar scored two touchdowns and Maranatha’s Andrew Elffers was held in check as the Heralds crashed and dashed the Minutemen’s homecoming fiesta, 24-21 Friday night.
“They played their best game of the year and we played our worst,” said Maranatha HC Pete Karavedas. “They were the better football team tonight.”
A key part to Whittier Christian being better was (receiver/running back) Escobar. The senior came into the game with three carries for three yards total over the course of seven games.
On the second play of the Heralds first series, Escobar went 70-yards straight through the Minutemen defense. Later in the third his 9-yard run exploited a muffed punt and gave the visitors a 21-7 lead.
“We’ve been holding off on showing Grant until tonight,” said Whittier Christian HC Sergio Gradilla. “You don’t have to be a genius to know he’s a great player. He did a great job for us.”
Escobar finished with eight carries for 89 yards and caught two more for 12 yards.
Following Escobar’s first run, the Heralds pieced together a 17 play, 89 yard drive, covering nearly eight minutes, before Cody Bronkar fell on quarterback Daniel Chacon’s fumble in the endzone for the game’s second touchdown.
During the march Whittier Christian overcame two penalties, converting once on third down and twice on fourth to sustain the drive. Chacon and Bronkar connected four times for 53 yards, before Chacon had the ball knocked loose on an 11-yard run and Bronkar recovered it for the score. Bronkar then caught the two-pointer from Chacon and it was 14-0 Heralds.
Maranatha, forced to punt on its first two possessions, got back into the game on its third when Elffers went 53-yards over the top to Cliff Martin to make it 14-7.
This was the Minutemen’s lone highlight of the first half. Their next two drives ended with three and outs, Elffers was sacked three times before the break and completed 7 of 10 passes for 107 yards and a score.
The poor quality of the photo at least gives you a sense of the quality of the Heralds performance defensively. Here Joel Rhone (#7) brings down Andrew Elffers (#15).
The second half wasn’t much better as he completed only 5 of 10 passes for 39 yards (12-20-146 yards, Td total) and was sacked twice more.
“We saw the Salesian game,” said Gradilla. “Our game plan was to get as much pressure on him as possible and our defense did a great job.”
Particularly shining at linebacker was Joel Rhone.
“He’s a great kid, he made the move from running back to outside linebacker this year because of his speed and has been great.”
After losing control of the punt and Escobar made it 21-7 early in the third, the Minutemen closed the gap with 1:37 left in the quarter. Omar Younger took a handoff, heading to his left before making a cut up field, bunny hopping over a pile up, and disappearing on a 72-yard scoring run.
Then it was back to work for the defending Olympic League champs who went 80 yards on 14 plays (including 2 receptions for 41 yards by Bronkar), adding a 29-yard field goal by Dylan Murphy to make the score 24-14.
Bronkar finished with 7 catches for 110 yards.
Six minutes later Maranatha cobbled together a final drive, using a hook and ladder play, before Younger scored on a 4-yard run.
The onside kick failed and with it the Minutemen fell to 6-1 while Whittier Christian improved to 5-3.
“Our problem has been we’ve been inconsistent all year, but this was a game our players were looking forward to,” said Gradilla. “We had a great game plan and it came together.”
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