by Joey Crandall [email protected]
With little more than a minute remaining and Douglas holding onto a four-point lead against Spanish Springs Friday night, Luke Houghton found himself thrust into the spotlight.
Spanish Springs chipped its onside kick his direction and the Douglas junior seized the moment.
Houghton sprinted forward, snatched the ball and raced away with a game-sealing touchdown as Douglas picked up a 23-13 win, its first Northern Division victory of the year.
“All the defenders were coming straight at me,” Houghton said. “I just thought, I’m going for the ball.
“I caught it, saw an open lane and knew I was going for a touchdown.”
The score was one of two kick return touchdowns for the Tigers Friday night.
With the game knotted at 7 coming out of halftime, Douglas senior Nick Abreu returns the second-half kickoff 78 yards for the score and the 14-7 lead. It was Abreu’s third kickoff return for a score this season.
“I just put all the trust in the world in my teammates and ended up breaking it for a touchdown,” Abreu said. “This win gives us momentum. We have two home games coming up, we just have to keep bringing it and trying to turn that momentum into wins.”
Special teams accounted for 17 of Douglas’ points on the night, as Adrian Gonzalez kicked a 30-yard field goal in the third quarter. The kickoff coverage team then forced and recovered a Spanish Springs fumble.
“The game is in thirds,” Douglas coach Ernie Monfiletto said. “It’s something we emphasize all the time. We spend a lot of time on it and it paid off tonight.”
The teams traded possessions twice to open the game before Spanish Springs scored on a 17-yard pass in the first quarter.
Douglas evened it up with two minutes remaining in the first half as Cale Kynett grabbed a screen pass from Bryce James and cut sharply across the field to score from 23 yards out.
Douglas DEFENSE LEADS WAY TO WIN
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Photo courtesy of Ron Harpin/ www.rahphotosnv.com
Cody Ball (22) deflects a pass in the end zone against Spanish Springs last week.
time. We spend a lot of time on it and it paid off tonight.”
The teams traded possessions twice to open the game before Spanish Springs scored on a 17-yard pass in the first quarter.
Douglas evened it up with two minutes remaining in the first half as Cale Kynett grabbed a screen pass from Bryce James and cut sharply across the field to score from 23 yards out.
“We’ve definitely been capable of this,” Abreu said. “Tonight we just came together as one and that just never happened before.”
The Douglas defense was the unsung hero of the night, limiting a Spanish Springs offense that had put up 28 points against Carson and 39 points against North Valleys earlier in the season.
Andrew Jensen had a number of sacks in the game, Tre Jackson picked off a pass in the end zone to halt a promising second-half drive for Spanish Springs and linebackers Kaleb Foster, Reagan Roberson, Cale Kynett and Tyler Marguth kept the Spanish Springs run game from getting rolling.
Ryan Wasser, Trevor Tierney, Cody Ball and Sam Melhus each had key pass breakups deep in Tiger territory as well.
“It’s that old Black Hat defense coming back,” Monfiletto said. “They played with great energy tonight. These kids, the whole team, they deserve it. They have worked their butts off and they have been loyal to this program. They didn’t hang their heads. This week of practice was better than last, and last week was better than the one before.
“These kids could have shut it down when they dropped to 1-5 and no one outside of this circle would have blamed them. But they’ve had faith and stuck with it.”
Monfiletto produced a coin from his pocket and explained its meaning.
“One of my assistant coaches, his brother is in the military,” he said. “This is his Wing Commander Coin that he shared with me. It says to lead and follow ferociously. That was our inspiration tonight. We wanted to be ferocious in our efforts.
“We’re just taking it one game at a time from hereon.”
Douglas hosts Galena at 7 p.m. next Friday.