Modesto latest MMC team to fall to Sonora

It's up to Davis High to defend the honor of the Modesto Metro Conference, which is staring at a second consecutive winless season against smaller Sonora.

Sonora is 6-0 against the MMC's larger schools going back to early in the 2005 season, when it lost 7-6 to Johansen.

The Wildcats were 3-0 vs. the MMC a year ago, and they set up another possible 3-0 start with Friday's 43-14 win over Modesto at Modesto Junior College.

It was a familiar gameplan, as Sonora (2-0) used running back Dan Link to batter the Panthers' defense. He gained 209 yards and scored four TDs on 21 carries.

"Smashmouth football," was how Panthers' defensive coach Josh Vincent described Sonora. "They took it right to us. It wasn't anything we didn't expect."

Link, a 6-foot-1, 195-pounder senior who added 15 pounds or so during the offseason, rarely went outside the tackles. A rare outside run was in the third quarter, when he took a handoff on a sweep to the right from the Modesto 18.

Link cut upfield as he approached the sidelines, ran over a few defenders to reach the 5 and then barreled into the end zone to give Sonora a 29-7 lead.

The rest of the night, though, Link was plowing up the middle behind all-Valley Oak League center Nate Gray (6-1, 230) and the rest of Sonora's powerful line.

"Modesto split out its defensive ends, so it made their defense thin in the middle," said Link, who had six carries of 16 yards or more. "The offensive line was setting me up pretty good, making good blocks and getting into the open field.

"When I saw someone get lower than me, I gripped the ball and went at them."

Link ran for 151 yards and two TDs in last week's 28-15 win over defending MMC champ Johansen. Davis, off to a 2-0 start after Friday's victory over Turlock and the early season MMC favorite, has Sonora next week at Downey High.

Modesto fell behind 15-0 in the second quarter after Link's second TD, but James Ingram picked up a pooched kickoff and returning it 80 yards for a TD.

That was the extend of Modesto's offensive highlights, however, as Sonora limited the Panthers to 142 yards. Sonora, by contrast, piled up 388 yards offense -- every one of them on the ground.

Sonora can't expect to duplicate that success against Davis. Junior quarterback Ryan Emerald, who had a minor offensive role the first two weeks, will likely be called on to help beat Davis.

Sonora, with 1,350 students, has half the enrollment of Modesto or Davis

"We can throw the ball, we just didn't need to the first two weeks," said Link, who now has 360 yards and six TDs in two games. "We know Davis will be more physical than these two games."