{"id":29964,"date":"2012-11-24T00:09:22","date_gmt":"2012-11-24T07:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=29964"},"modified":"2017-06-10T10:15:48","modified_gmt":"2017-06-10T17:15:48","slug":"la-serna-35-west-covina-17-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=29964","title":{"rendered":"La Serna Gets Another Shot at Title"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Gio Long is all smiles after scoring three touchdowns to lead La Serna back to the Southeast Finals<\/p><\/div>\n

(Whittier)- La Serna\u00a0outscored West Covina\u00a035-3 after falling\u00a0behind early\u00a0by two touchdowns and went to to beat the Bulldogs 35-17 Friday night at Whittier District Field to advance to the Southeast Finals.<\/p>\n

Gio Long scored three touchdowns and Luke Gonzales added\u00a0the other two\u00a0to lead the Lancers to the big win.\u00a0Gonzales rushed for\u00a091 yards on\u00a0nine carries including touchdown runs of 13 and 50 yards. Long was the man\u00a0for La Serna in the red zone. His three touchdown runs\u00a0came from\u00a0one, four and two yards out.<\/p>\n

The game\u00a0started out reminiscent\u00a0of last year’s 84-21\u00a0West Covina rout of La Serna in the Southeast Finals.\u00a0The Bulldogs scored\u00a0twice in just over two minutes to close out the first quarter\u00a0take a 14-0 advantage. They also missed scoring\u00a0early in the first when they were stopped three times\u00a0inside the ten which would have given them a 7-0 lead.<\/p>\n

After missing that opportunity the Bulldogs cashed in\u00a0on their next.\u00a0Henry Tarin\u00a0threw\u00a0a pass to Antonio “Noodles” Hull who in turn fired a strike to a wide open Jesus Wong who raced 52 yards for the\u00a0score.<\/p>\n

La Serna was forced to punt on its next possession\u00a0and WestCo made another big play. Sidney Jones fielded it, broke a tackle and was off to the races\u00a083 yards for the touchdown with 31 seconds left in the first quarter. Just like that it was 14-0\u00a0West Covnia. Unfortunately for the Bulldog faithful, it\u00a0was the last time\u00a0West Covina saw the end zone.<\/p>\n

The Lancers put together\u00a0two long drives on their next two possessions to get even.\u00a0 First they pieced together a\u00a0seven play, 60-yard march that culminated with a\u00a013 yard run by Gonzales. On their next series Frankie Palmer went to work.\u00a0He ran for 19 yards and later hit John MacFarland for 20 yards down to the one. Long capped it with a one yard plunge to knot it at 14.<\/p>\n

Evan Hertenstein booted a 32 yard\u00a0field goal\u00a0as the first half clock ran out to give West Covina a 17-14 lead at the break. It was the last time\u00a0the Bulldogs scored.<\/p>\n

The momentum turned quickly in the third quarter. After kicking off to West Covina, the Lancer defense forced\u00a0an Aaron Salgado fumble at the Bulldog 11. Two plays later Long trucked into the endzone\u00a0to give La Serna its first lead.<\/p>\n

West Covina went three and\u00a0out\u00a0and the Lancers\u00a0wasted\u00a0no time\u00a0in\u00a0striking again. After a 16 yard pass play from Palmer to D’andre Sanchez, Gonzales escaped a couple of tackles and rumbled 50 yards\u00a0for a touchdown. Three minutes into the quarter and\u00a0it was 28-17 La Serna.<\/p>\n

The Lancer defense shut down West Covina the rest of the way.\u00a0The Bulldogs punted twice, fumbled and were stopped\u00a0twice on fourth down in the second half. The Lancers ate up the clock and\u00a0put together another\u00a0extended march in the third quarter.\u00a0Palmer led La Serna on an 80-yard, 16 play drive that ultimately put the game away. Long punched it in again- this time on a two-yard run to put La Serna up 35-17 with 7:37 left and on the road back to the championship game.<\/p>\n

Palmer rushed for 57 yards and threw for 89 yards without a turnover.<\/p>\n

Hull ran for 81 yards\u00a0and\u00a015 carries and threw for 58 and a score for West Covina.<\/p>\n

“If you’ve been around our guys the last two or three years, you know our guys never quit,” said La Serna Coach Margarito Beltran\u00a0of the Lancers falling behind\u00a0by 14.<\/p>\n

“They’re\u00a0a very good football team. They’re physical and I thought their defense did a good job, “said West Covina Coach Mike Maggiore of La Serna.”They’re a very solid football team. But I’m proud of our guys. Their backs were to the wall the last\u00a0four weeks\u00a0and they can hold their heads high.”<\/p>\n

La Serna will face Downey next week for the Southeast Title.\u00a0The Vikings routed Santa Fe 35-3 to earn the trip. West Covina’s two year championship reign ends as the Bulldogs now look towards 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Whittier)- La Serna\u00a0outscored West Covina\u00a035-3 after falling\u00a0behind early\u00a0by two touchdowns and went to to beat the Bulldogs 35-17 Friday night at Whittier District Field to advance to the Southeast Finals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12816],"tags":[6355,8629,8273,8339,5822,8601,8628,7786,8627,207,1255,8588,11547,6350],"class_list":["post-29964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hsfootball","tag-antonio-noodles-hull","tag-dandre-sanchez","tag-downey-football","tag-evan-hertenstein","tag-frankie-palmer","tag-gio-long","tag-henry-tarin","tag-la-serna-football","tag-luke-gonzales","tag-margarito-beltran","tag-mike-maggiore","tag-santa-fe-football","tag-southeast-division","tag-west-covina-football"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29964"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29964\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59040,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29964\/revisions\/59040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}