1 week Ago
CARSON — The second-seeded Carson football team dominated the first 30 minutes of Friday’s L.A. City Section Open Division quarterfinal against seventh-seeded Garfield.
However, the Colts found themselves trailing by seven with six minutes to play in the third quarter. Sophomore Michael O’Dell made the first of two big plays for the Colts (7-4), a 55-yard kickoff return setting up the tying touchdown, that helped turn the game around as the Colts scored 13 points in a four-minute span to take the lead and the defense made it stand up for a 27-17 win. Carson will host San Pedro in next week’s semifinals.
“It nice to get the W. First round games can be pretty tough,” Carson coach Michael Christensen said. “We had some rust as we hadn’t played in almost a month.
We have a lot of work to do, but we are happy to keep playing.” Carson scored on its first possession in two plays as tight end Dayton Morris caught a 41-yard touchdown pass from Chris Fields early in the first quarter for a 7-0 lead. Garfield answered with a 25-yard touchdown run by Cesar Reyes with 5:01 to play in the half to tie the score.
Carson looked to go ahead as Kameryn Hurst broke free for a 58-yard touchdown run, but an illegal block negated part of the run, but the Colts still had good field position at the Garfield 29. The Colts moved the ball down to the one-yard line, but were stymied three straight times forcing a 32-yard field goal attempt which was no good. Garfield scored midway through the third quarter to take the lead on another Reyes touchdown run, this one from eight yards to give the Bulldogs a 14-7 lead.
O’Dell, the up man, on Carson’s kickoff return team, caught the ball on the Colts 25 and broke through the pack and down the sideline to the Garfield 20, before being forced out of bounds. Three plays later running back Preston Leomiti bulled his way into end zone for an 8-yard touchdown to tie the game with 5:44 to play in the third quarter. On the next series, freshman Bennie Saulter read Garfield quarterback Robert Cedillo’s eyes and stepped in front of a pass making a leaping interception at the Bulldogs 41 yard line.
“I had watched the film study and I knew if he lined up outside it was going to go my way, and I was ready for it and made the play,” Saulter said. “I love my secondary, we stepped up and made big plays tonight and got the dub.” After the interception Carson faced a third-and-8 at the 39 and O’Dell again made a big play for the Colts making a leaping grab at the 4-yard line, setting up Hurst 3-yard touchdown run that gave Carson the lead at 20-14 with 1:44 to play in the quarter.
“I saw that hole and said I’ve got to hit it. I should have scored, but I went out of bounds, but I made up for it with that catch later on,” O’Dell said. “They were double-covering me all night, but I read it well and got in between them and Chris threw that up, I knew I had to go get it.
” Garfield looked to be going in for a go-ahead touchdown, but the Carson defense stepped up, holding the Bulldogs to a 27-yard field goal by Axel Ortiz, making it 20-17 with 11:42 left in the game. The Colts then put together an eight-minute, 13-play, 76-yard drive with a mixture of runs and passes. Hurst capped the drive with his second touchdown of the night, a one-yard plunge with 3:34 to play to ice the win.
“I told everybody to keep their head up and keep fighting,” Hurst said of when the Colts were trailing in the game. ““We had to keep pushing on the last drive to close out the game. I told the team that we got to keep pushing each week to send the seniors off on a good note with a championship.
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