The year of the Scots, possibly.
Varsity football defeated Woodside High School 53-29 away on Sept. 1.
The Scots demonstrated their grit and agility against Woodside, a team that Carlmont usually loses to.
“Woodside is a B-level program. On paper, they are supposed to be better,” said Carlmont Head Coach Jake Messina.
Similar to last week’s game, Demarii Blanks, a senior, scored a 50-yard touchdown in the first twenty seconds of the first quarter.
“[The first touchdown] made a huge impact for me because as soon as I saw a wide open hole and scored, I thought to myself ‘I’ll be doing this the rest of the night.’ Scoring on the first drive and play really sets the tone and hypes everyone up,” said Blanks.
Anthony Arteaga and Devon Sagon, both seniors, along with Julian Morin, a junior, led the Scots’ offensive line through their rushes down the field.
With two minutes remaining in the first quarter, Artega scored a touchdown. One minute later, Blanks scored a 60-yard touchdown, shoving three Wildcat defenders to the ground. The Scots were ahead 19-0.
Palthe said, “We were so much faster than them on offense that they would still be trying to find out who had the ball and we would already be 20 yards downfield. They were physically bigger than us in several positions, but I don’t think they were ready for how strong we were.”
In the second quarter, Woodside failed to move the ball forward despite field goal attempts and passing. Carlmont’s defensive line intercepted many throws from Joseph King, a junior at Woodside.
Sagon ran down the sideline and was flagged at the 30-yard line, but proceeded to run through the end zone. Players were unsure whether or not the touchdown was valid, however, the referee flagged the play as a sideline warning to the Scots. Carlmont followed up with a two-point conversion by Morin, which brought the Scots to a 27-0 lead.
But the Wildcats were not going to give up this early.
A punt return by Wildcat Darnell Ellis, a senior, at their 41-yard line began Woodside’s first scoring possession. In their fourth down at the five-yard line, King scored a touchdown, followed by a field goal. The Wildcats still had a long road ahead of them with Carlmont leading 27-7 .
“We blitzed our weak inside linebacker to the outside and blitzed our strong inside linebacker into the strong side. The quarterback ran a fake under the running back and when the backers and linemen bit on the fake, [King] cut it back into the gap that was opened up from the blitz,” said Darian Dennler, a junior at Carlmont.
Carlmont replied with a 70-yard touchdown by Morin and a two-point conversion scored by Blanks, leaving the score at 35-7.
In the last play of the first half, Woodside junior Luis Robles received the ball from King, but sophomore Jonaven Kuhn sacked Robles at the 10-yard line, which stopped the score from rising.
The Scots ended the first half with a 28 point lead.
“During halftime, we talked about how well we played in the first half and our coaches were very proud and positive. But by the end, we focused the conversation on finishing the game. Just because we were up by a lot didn’t mean we could be comfortable with the game,” said Henry Reich, a senior.
None of the coaching staff allowed the team to slack at halftime. Messina could be heard yelling at his players “up tempo, up tempo” throughout the second half to keep the Scots on their toes.
Handoffs, rushing, and receiving by Wildcat seniors Derek Smith and Ellis enabled Woodside to be in the end zone for the second time. A perfect pass by King turned into a receiving touchdown by Smith at the back line of the end zone was followed by a field goal. With nine minutes left in the third quarter, the score was 35-14, Carlmont leading.
Two minutes later, Blanks countered with another 50-yard touchdown, which raised the Scots’ lead even higher, to 41-14 Carlmont.
The Wildcats continued to break through Carlmont’s defensive line as Smith scored his second touchdown of the night in the third quarter.
As expected, the Scots responded with another touchdown, this time by Morin.
The third quarter ended with Carlmont leading with a score of 47-21.
Woodside started the fourth quarter strong with a 25-yard receiving touchdown catch by Smith less than one minute in. The two-point conversion was then scored by Robles, which brought the score to 47-29 Carlmont.
Messina directed his team to let the clock run and take their time. The Scots wanted to be in control as much as possible.
In the last major play of the game, junior Miles Tayes scored his first season touchdown.
The Scots won the game 53-29.
Despite their win, the Scots were not perfect. Carlmont struggled with their field goals.
Reich said, “It was unfortunate. I only got to attempt three extra point kicks because our line could not block the other team long enough for me to get a kick off safely. It wasn’t worth the risk of one of opposition coming in and potentially hurting my leg or Palthe, the holder.”
The Wildcats also had many mistakes of their own.
“Starting off the game a lot of our challenges were mainly self-inflicted. We knew we were going up against a pretty talented team. We needed to settle ourselves down and play our game,” said Woodside Head Coach Justin Andrews.
Over the past two games, the Scots have been focusing on carrying the ball.
“It’s a misdirection offense and we try to do different things to get the ball and in different guys’ hands. And we did. I think six guys carried the ball,” said Messina.
By the end of the game, Blanks rushed for 261 yards, and with a grand total of 416 rushing yards for the past two games. Blanks has a goal of 2,000 yards for the season. None of Woodside’s players came close to Blanks’ number.
The Scots will play Mountain View High School away on Sept. 8 and hope to continue their winning streak.
Palthe said, “I’m looking forward to one of our biggest challenges this season and seeing what we can do against a great team.”
