Page 9 - Sanger Herald 10-11-18 E-edition

SangerSports
SANGER HERALD * PAGE 1B * THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2018
Water polo girls look to make another push this year
By Mike Nemeth
Sanger Herald
A representative from Fresno City College gathered Sanger High’s senior varsity water polo players poolside after the Apaches demolished the visiting Edison High Tigers.
The game proved more of a practice session, allowing Sanger’s athletes to work on their “sweeps, backhands and picks,” said head coach Hillary Boos.
“They’ve got a tough tournament this weekend,” she said after the Oct. 4 match. “We play some good teams.”
And her Apaches proved to be challenged. The Grizzly Classic, sponsored by Granite Bay High at American River College in Sacramento, was tough on the Apaches on Oct. 5 and 6. But playing better teams is often Boos’ strategy to cultivate wins later in the season as her Apaches learn from the knocks and improve.
Back to the meeting with the Fresno City rep, Boos
Mike Nemeth / Sanger Herald
Goalie Bailee Poole blocks a shot against Edison last week at Sanger High. The girls water polo team is young but working hard to improve for the post season.
Potter movie. “I loved the campus,” she said.
Williams got to bunk with another student from California. She said she also loved the polo team. “The dorm looked like a museum,” she said. A nice museum.
And she said her current team is progressing. “Totally,” she said.
Victoria Torres-Huerta, a junior, said she was a little nervous at the start of the season “because we’re bringing up new people. (But) we’re doing really well. I’m not nervous anymore. We’re coming along, and we’re progressing really nicely. We’re all figuring out how each other works.”
Tienda said her new team is “coming out pretty strong now. We’re pretty good after starting over from scratch. Games like this help us later on in the season for Clovis teams.”
Boys water polo
Edison’s Tigers came out strong against the boys varsity Apaches team Oct. 4, scoring four goals in the
opening quarter to Sanger’s two.
The two teams tore up the pool, swimming furiously back and forth, with the Apaches goalie in the first half, senior Joshua Herman, providing some pretty heroic blocks against a fired-up Edison squad. But the Edison offense kept coming with Tiger seniors Damian Young, Malcolm Wanless and Dimitri Kapetan proving difficult to defend.
And Edison sophomore Tyler Mrkaich also contributed to the damage. The resulting score was 13-4, Tigers.
Sanger senior Zack Stricker said afterward he was a little frustrated with the result. The Sanger team has been beset with coaching and roster changes over the past several years and has worked hard this season to hone the talents of its players and build teamwork in a sport that requires lots of both.
“We all kept fighting as
See Water Polo, Page 2B
called over her seniors, Addison Williams, Bailee Poole and Emily Tienda.
The recruiter asked them what colleges they were considering. Each rattled off a number of institutions.
“(University of California) Davis, Cal Poly,” Poole said.
“University of Toronto, University of Hawaii at
Manoa,” Williams said. “Berkeley (UC), San Diego (CSU) and Hawaii,”
Tienda said.
“That’s great,” the
recruiter said. “But if any of those don’t work out or your plans change, we have a really great program. I think each of you would fit right in.”
And they would. Of
course. They’re Apaches and part of one of the best high school programs in the central San Joaquin Valley.
Williams had just returned from a recruiting visit to Toronto, where she said the campus had the historic charm of an Ivy League school and also could have been something straight out of a Harry
Apaches 'waited all year' for this battle
By Mike Nemeth
Sanger Herald
With 2:16 on the clock, Bullard running back Marcus Fulcher blew into the end zone for a touchdown Oct. 5, bringing the Knights to within a point in a nail-biter of a game, 35-34.
The crowd — perhaps the biggest of the season at Tom Flores Stadium and including members of the champion 1998 Apache team — began chanting, “Block that kick, block that kick.” But Bullard coach Don Arax chose to go again with Fulcher for the 2 point conversion.
Fulcher delivered. The Bullard sideline celebrated. All the Knights had to do is stop Sanger, something they had done the previous year in the playoffs when Bullard orchestrated a 24-14 win with a touchdown again in the fourth.
Senior defender Jude Groft recalled the heartache of that loss and said he knew his team wasn’t going to allow the Knights a repeat.
In fact, the Apaches marched down from their 20-yard line, and in a dozen plays with just seconds on the clock at the 13, senior kicker and running back David Ayala split the uprights with a 30-yard field goal and sent Sanger fans into a frenzy.
Final score: 38-36.
“It feels incredible,” running back Orlando Douglas said afterward. “The whole team has been waiting a year to play this game, and we beat them. Got them out of our hair.”
Even defensive line
Mike Nemeth / Sanger Herald
Kicker David Ayala, No. 30, makes a 30-yard field goal with just seconds left in the game to win it against Bullard, 38-36.
quarter. “Aaaarrrgghh!” he said, explaining exactly how to spell the word. Motta later heard the story and recreated the exact sound of anguish. For Garza, the game was the first he’d seen in two years. He serves in the Air Force, stationed in Clovis, N.M.
Valencia, who’s attending Fresno State, could barely contain his joy when Ayala made the final score. “This is Sanger Banger right here,” he said. “I still love (Apache) football. This is where Bangers come out. That’s a Sanger Banger win.”
“Whew,” Garza said. “Too close.”
Here is how that “too close” scenario unfolded. And nearly everybody on the team contributed. Coaches pulled players off the bench and the first string offense did not falter.
With 2 minutes remaining, junior quarterback Noel Collazo passed to wide receiver and senior Jake Boust. But Bullard fought back. Hard.
Collazo got sacked at 1:40 left. It was third down and 5.
Then on a fourth down and nothing to lose, Collazo threw the ball to Boust who got a first down at the 38 yard line with 1:27 on the clock. Then it was Boust again getting the reception, with 1:03 remaining.
With 49 seconds left, Collazo rocketed the ball to Agina, who leapt up and caught it only to get slammed so that he somersaulted hard into the turf. His shins bled and grass covered his face after
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coach Nikko Motta couldn’t contain his enthusiasm. “I’m ecstatic,” he said.
“Emotional, overwhelmed, happy,” Groft said, attempting to explain his frame of mind. “They’re not only a close game, they (Knights) like to talk trash on the line. So it definitely feels good.”
“We knew we needed to win,” junior running back and wide receiver Kosi Agina said. “We needed redemption.”
“It’s a hell of a game,” Damian Duarte said. “It was on our calendar all year, since they beat us last
year in the playoffs.”
And Ayala said as he untaped a wrist, “It was just all heart, man.” He said he was happy that his kick covered the distance and earned the 3 points. Very. “It was the coaches who put their trust in me to do that. Last week (against Madera), it was almost the exact same thing, and I
missed it.”
But he and John Pena, a
sophomore who held the ball the last game, reprised their roles. And this time it paid off.
After the field goal, Ayala remained on the field on his
knees, his helmet to the turf like he was praying. He wasn’t. He was hurt. “I got drilled,” he said, explaining how Bullard defenders, desperate to prevent his score, piled into him.
Apache head coach Jorge Pena praised the resilience of his team. He said despite multiple injuries, odds and all the challenges posed by the last four teams, Sanger has pulled out close wins. The Apaches beat Lemoore in a 49-41 thriller, followed after a bye with a 27-24 road victory over Paso Robles and another outlasting Madera 36-33.
“I’m just really proud of how our kids keep fighting — just finding a way to win,” he said.
The entire game provided nonstop uncertainty. Every time Sanger got ahead, Bullard came roaring back. At one point, Sanger High principal Dan Chacon leaned over to former players Josiah Arreola, Adrian Valencia and Josh Garza and said, “Get in there.”
All three watched the game closely. At one point, Garza quoted Motta when he saw a missed tackle at the start of the third
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