Prep football: Piner runs to another big victory

Despite the big scoring deficit, the El Molino High School football team fought hard Friday night, but Piner proved once again be one of the most prolific squads in the area, earning its eighth straight win, 48-7.

The Prospectors (8-0 overall, 2-0 North Bay League-Redwood Division) have dominated throughout the season, outscoring opponents 445-21, including six shutouts, through Friday’s game.

The Lions (3-4 overall, 1-1 NBL-Redwood) have had a much more balanced season and entered the game with a .500 record that included last week’s 50-44 loss to Santa Rosa High School in overtime.

El Molino put up a strong fight against the Prospectors, especially in the first half, but a 28-point second half proved too much to overcome for the Lions in Piner’s win.

“It was just like a number of things that just went sideways. Our guys played hard, I told them we would need to play a near perfect game to beat those guys, they’re definitely beatable, so, it’s just too bad it didn’t work out the way we wanted it to,” El Molino head coach Randy Parmeter said.

The Prospectors started the first quarter by unleashing its talented passing game resulting in quarterback Yonaton Isack hitting Piner’s stud wide receiver Isaac Torres on a jump ball that he brought down for a touchdown.

Piner got the running game going at the end of the first quarter and it paid off with a 10-yard touchdown run from Adrian Torres at the start of the second quarter to go up 14-0

El Molino’s defense played well, despite the scores, slowing down and stifling much of Piner’s normally high-flying offense.

But in the final minutes of the second quarter Isack found the end zone again for the Prospectors, this time on a 45-yard run for the score.

A big kick return from the Lions’ Colman Hayes set the offense up on their opponent’s 20-yard line. And with less than three minutes left in the first half, Weston Lewis hit Jalen Hall on a 21-yard touchdown pass to shorten the lead to 21-7 at the half.

During halftime, disappointed with his team’s performance, Bell had his players take off the black jerseys they started the game wearing and put back on their normal maroon jerseys. He felt his players weren’t giving an all-around effort, like receivers not blocking for example.

“I just wanted to let them know that we work for everything, Piner’s never had this, so we work for everything. So, if you’re at your job and you don’t work you don’t get things, you don’t get raises. So, they didn’t play very well in the first half, so I said, ‘If you don’t work, I’m not giving you a raise put them maroon jerseys back on,’” Piner head coach Terence Bell said.

The Lions’ passing defense continued to make it tough for Piner, so the Prospectors turned to the run game, utilizing Isack and Adrian Torres. The two found space on the ground leading to a long drive midway through the third quarter that culminated in a 9-yard touchdown pass to Jake Herman.

Following a lucky bounce, the Prospectors recovered an unintentional onside kick. On the very next play Torres carried the ball up the gut for a big gain to put the Piner offense back in opponent’s territory and then scored on a 1-yard run, increasing the Piner lead to 34-7 at the end of three quarters.

The Prospectors were in control from there on, scoring on a 5-yard run from Adrian Torres and a 3-yard pass to Isaac Torres in the fourth quarter to seal the 48-7 victory and keep their remarkable undefeated season going.