Spirits were high both on the home sideline and in the home bleachers just moments prior to Kathleen MacDonald High School’s first ever varsity football game on Friday night. Unfortunately for the home fans, it took no time at all to receive a reality check.
On the opening kickoff, the visiting Santa Clara Bruins delivered the Condors a “welcome to varsity” moment by easily recovering a pooched onside kick. Santa Clara recovered the live ball with such ease that they returned it all the way to the end zone.
By rule, Santa Clara could not advance the kickoff recovery, but nonetheless, it was a sign of things to come. The Bruins would cruise to a 40-0 shutout victory, spoiling the inaugural varsity football game for the Condors.
“That’s just something you have in the repertoire of kicks,” chimed Bruins Head Coach Nelson Gifford on the surprise onside kick to open the game. “When you go into a game like this, you don’t have a good picture of their special teams. Sometimes, it’s actually safer to just kick it short to get an idea. It just so happened that they didn’t field it cleanly and we were able to recover it.”
“Tonight was just about taking care of business,” continued Gifford. “We knew the situation that we were walking into. MacDonald is a new team. They are establishing a program. They don’t necessarily have all the depth. So, if we go out and take care of our business, we knew we should do pretty well.”
Two Bruins who performed especially well in this season-opening victory were Taysean Reed and Joseph Manueli. The former came away with a big pass breakup in the endzone on a fourth down play that ended the Condors’ first possession.
Reed would later add an interception. Manueli, meanwhile, was nearly unstoppable on the ground, rushing for 118 yards on just 10 carries and scoring three of the Bruins’ six touchdowns.
“I felt good out there. All we needed to do was follow our assignments,” noted Manueli on the team’s running success. “The line did a really great job. They were awesome at opening the gaps.”
“I knew they were gonna go deep; they were already trying to pick on me,” chimed Reed on his first-quarter pass breakup in the endzone. “I had a feeling they were going to test me. I played patient and waited for the deep streak and I saw it coming.”
While the MacDonald side perhaps didn’t see such a lopsided score coming in their inaugural game, the young squad did provide some stellar highlights.
Quarterback Moussa Fall showed off impressive athletic ability and a strong arm. His 6’3” frame to go along with his speed ruanning and arm throwing reminded this writer of a young Colin Kaepernick.
Furthermore, Condors’ wide receiver Dominic Hunt made a stunning one-handed grab, while junior linebacker Nate Pulickial impressed with a touchdown-saving tackle at the one-yard line on what looked like a sure touchdown.
“We showed glimpses of being a good football team, definitely glimpses of it there,” acknowledged Condors Head Coach Burt Codera. “But you can’t just have glimpses of it. We showed our inexperience. We’re only going to get better each week. We just have to focus on the things we can control, doing our jobs and getting better every week.”
MacDonald will look to bounce back next week when it hosts Lowell of San Francisco. Santa Clara, meanwhile, will hope to improve to 2-0 when it hosts Monte Vista Christian of Watsonville.
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