Late score dooms Oakdale as Manteca wins Sac-Joaquin Section Division III crown
Oakdale met in its postgame circle one last time. Players’ eyes were filled with tears.
After head coach Trent Merzon gave his postgame speech, two players spoke up. One was No. 34, Dalton Vargas, who revealed he played with a torn anterior cruciate ligament and meniscus because he wanted to finish this year of football with his teammates.
The Mustangs had their chances — including a last-second heave on the game’s final possession — but couldn’t capitalize as a 59-yard connection between Hudson Wyatt and Zion Allen with less than 30 seconds left lifted Manteca to a 35-28 victory in the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division III championship at St. Mary’s High.
Wyatt and Allen didn’t connect often, but when they did, it served as a body blow for the Mustangs.
The first was at the end of the first half. Manteca held a 14-7 lead but its offense stalled and the Buffaloes were forced to punt. The punt, though, bounced off an Oakdale player near midfield and the Buffaloes recovered at the Mustangs’ 45-yard line.
Manteca elected to go for it all and Wyatt threw a perfectly placed ball down the right sideline to a streaking Allen for the 45-yard score, putting Oakdale down 21-7 heading into halftime.
“That was a big swing, you could feel it.” said Oakdale coach Trent Merzon.
But Merzon had one message to his team in the locker room.
“Keep swinging. Keep doing our thing, keep battling.” Merzon said.
Needing a touchdown to keep the game within reach, Oakdale opened the second half with an eight-play drive capped by a 15-yard run by Jace Rau around the right edge, cutting Manteca’s lead to 21-14 with 8 minutes, 54 seconds left in the third quarter.
The Buffaloes answered immediately courtesy of a Blake Nichelson 47-yard touchdown run, for his second score of the game.
Nichelson finished with 200 yards and two touchdowns on 29 carries.
Rau scored one more time before the end of the third period, this time beating Manteca’s players to the left pylon, to bring the Mustangs within one touchdown at the end of the quarter.
Just as it did all postseason, the Oakdale defense came up with a big stop, forcing Manteca to punt three plays into the fourth quarter.
On the first play of the Mustangs’ drive, Holt, who went 11 of 20 for 227 yards and two touchdowns, faked handoffs to his two running backs, stood tall in the backfield and fired a pass to Kevin Camelin, who hauled it in at midfield and ran the remaining 50 yards to complete the 68-yard pass play and tie the game at 28 apiece with 10:11 left in the fourth quarter.
“Our kids got back in it,” Merzon said. “We had a lot of momentum. We had the ball tied up with a chance to go win the thing and we had a big play on their sideline that got called back by a holding penalty (that) put us behind the stick and we couldn’t overcome that.”
The Mustangs started their next drive on their own 37 but after a three penalties, a first and 10 turned to a second and 25, and they were forced to punt, taking away their momentum.
After two series ending in punts, the Buffaloes had the ball with 42 seconds left. Just as they did at the end of the first half, Wyatt scrambled and launched the ball down the field to a waiting Allen who caught the ball and made two Mustang defenders miss on the way to a 59-yard connection to ice the game, leaving the Mustangs with just over 20 seconds.
“I was really nervous,” said Allen, a senior who finished with three receptions for 116 yards and two touchdowns. “But I caught it, made two moves and scored. ... I made the moves, got to the outside and I was like ‘Touchdown?’ I was shocked.”
The Mustangs got the ball back on their own 40 yard line with 22 seconds left and worked their way to the Manteca 49 with four seconds left. Holt threw the ball into the end zone, but it was tipped by Nichelson to end the game.
“At that moment, we were going to try to get over here and take a shot to the end zone,” Merzon said. “Let’s see if we can make it to the end zone with a play. ... We kind of did what we wanted to do.
“We gave ourselves a chance. I love this group ... I love our program ... these nights are tough, but we’re going to fight to get back here.”
This story was originally published November 27, 2021 at 5:26 AM with the headline "Late score dooms Oakdale as Manteca wins Sac-Joaquin Section Division III crown."
