Tanner Shean runs at Carpinteria’s Aaron Vargas with lineman Edgar Cabrera during Friday’s game. (Presidio Sports Photo)
None of the 26 seniors on Santa Ynez’s football team had beaten Carpinteria until Friday night. That all changed as the Pirates wrecked the Warriors, 42-0, at Carpinteria Valley Memorial Stadium.
“It’s great. I can’t really describe it,” said Santa Ynez senior Austin Vreeland. “This is one of the great rivalries in the California state and I’m just loving it. It feels like we won the Super Bowl.”
Carpinteria had no answers for Santa Ynez. The Warriors failed to stop Santa Ynez on offense until the fourth quarter and Carpinteria’s offense didn’t record a first down in the first half.
“It’s been awhile since we’ve had a game like this where we just didn’t play well in all phases,” said Carpinteria head coach Ben Hallock.
Santa Ynez’s Gabe Prendergast hauls in a 36-yard catch that led to the Pirates’ second touchdown.
Michael McCoy and Vreeland were named Players of the Game for the Pirates, who improve to 2-0 on the season. The Warriors, playing their season opener, fall to 0-1.
McCoy had a number of long catches – including a 43-yard touchdown catch from Tanner Shean – and an interception on defense. Vreeland had scoring runs of 23 and 13 yards.
The 23-yarder was Santa Ynez’s first touchdown of the game, coming on the Pirates’ first possession with 7:51 remaining in the first quarter.
Carpinteria, with junior quarterback Mike Garibay making his varsity debut, struggled to make any progress on offense. Santa Ynez’s linemen repeatedly broke into the backfield to disrupt Carpinteria’s plans as if they knew what to expect.
“We studied the tape from last year more than we studied their scrimmage tape and saw what they did,” said Pirates head coach Josh McClurg. “You know Ben Hallock. Ben is going to do what Ben does, and they’re going to run power, and they’re going to run counter, and they’re going to run veer on you, and you got to stop it.”
The Pirates’ defensive unit has yet to give up a touchdown in two games this season.
“So it came down to our D-Line and I thought that Connor Epley, Dalton Payne, Reagan Roberts and the backup guys who kept rotating in, they played a phenomenal game and defensively they won it for us.”
Carpinteria finally made a first down in the third quarter on a 12-yard run by Timothy Jimenez, who was helped off the field late in the game with what Hallock described as an achilles injury flare up. An 11-yard run in the fourth quarter by Aaron Vargas was Carpinteria’s only other first down of the game. A bright spot for the Warriors was lineman Pancho Sanchez, who was named Carpinteria’s Player of the Game.
Epley scored Santa Ynez’s second touchdown on a five-yard run. The Pirates’ third scoring drive took nine plays and featured a fourth-down conversion on a run by Tye Hollingsworth. The next drive was even longer, a 14-play, 69-yard march capped by an 11-yard touchdown pass from Shean to Gabe Prendergast.
The Pirates led 27-0 at halftime. They received the kickoff to start the third quarter and scored on the first play. Vreeland set up Santa Ynez with a long kickoff return before McCoy grabbed his 43-yard scoring reception.
The Warriors (0-1) host Nipomo next week. The Titans (1-1) just lost to Lompoc 18-13 and defeated Pioneer Valley in Week Zero.
Santa Ynez hosts Dos Pueblos next Friday.
