Cloverdale falls to 2-3, visits Kelseyville on Friday
Execution, execution, execution.
That’s been the mantra for the Cloverdale varsity football squad this year in a season marked with flashes of brilliance combined with frustrating inconsistency.
The latter reared its ugly head again in a Friday, Sept. 22 visit to Fort Bragg, as the Eagles shot themselves in the foot with frequent miscues, sabotaging an otherwise solid effort in a 14-7 loss to the Timberwolves.
“We had a ton of mental mistakes and did the little things poorly,” Eagles head coach Chad Talley reported. “Fort Bragg gave us opportunity after opportunity to take over the game and we just couldn’t find that focus to do so.”
Cloverdale (2-3, 1-2) will try to regroup this week in preparation for its next challenge – a Friday, Sept. 29 trip to Kelseyville. The Knights (2-2, 1-1) are dealing with problems of their own this week, following a 50-29 non-league loss to St. Patrick/St. Vincent on Saturday.
Eagles’ offense sputters
Friday’s visit to Fort Bragg illustrated the common adage that the better team doesn’t always win, but rather the team that plays better on a given night.
Cloverdale was very much in the game the entire way, but missed opportunities and mistakes continued to throttle the offense. The Eagles scored their lone touchdown of the game in the second quarter when quarterback James Wirt broke loose on a veer option play, knotting the contest at 7-7.
Later in the period the Eagles appeared to score a go-ahead touchdown on a long pass, but the play was nullified due to a penalty. The Timberwolves stuck to a ground game that would produce a pair of touchdowns, while their defense did just enough to preserve a 14-7 win.
“Once again, effort wasn’t an issue, we just had trouble executing,” Talley noted.
Offense leaders for the Eagles included Wirt (3-18, 74 yards passing, TD rushing), John Wesele (4-12 yards rushing), Mel Alonso (3-74 yards receiving), Cesar Buenrostro (4-6 yards rushing), Shane Scalese (4-6 yards rushing) and BJ Grady (2-6 yards rushing).
Although defensive stats were not available, Ray Sayago recorded two solo tackles for the Eagles.
JV posts win
The Cloverdale JV squad improved to 1-1 in league and 2-1 overall on Friday with an 8-0 win over Fort Bragg. The Eagles broke a scoreless tie in the second quarter when defensive end Achim Glosser picked off a T-Wolves’ pass and raced 20 yards to the house. The Eagles made the lead stand up the rest of the way to secure the 8-0 win.
Cloverdale offensive leaders are quarterback Dylan Scaramella, running backs Shayne Turner and Anthony Rebottaro and receivers Logan Axelle and Colby Furia. Josh Lemley has been among the leading tacklers for the Eagles.
