Escalon too physical for Ripon, earns trip to Sac-Joaquin Section title game
A punishing running game and a physical defense are the two ingredients to playoff success.
Escalon used both on Friday night to reach the CIF Sac-Joaquin Division V championship game after throttling Trans-Valley League rival Ripon 34-10 at Lloyd Engel Field.
“It was a slugfest and you expect that in a semifinal against your rival,” Escalon coach Andrew Beam said. “We know that Ripon is probably bigger than us and faster, but at the end of the day, we felt like we were the more physical team. We were going to be tougher up front and we had to establish that.”
The No. 1-seeded Cougars (11-1) advance to the section title game against Hilmar (11-2) on Saturday at 6 p.m. at St. Mary’s High School in Stockton. The Yellowjackets, the No. 6 seed, beat Casa Roble 41-8 on Friday.
On Oct. 1, Escalon beat Hilmar 24-14. The last time the two teams played in a section championship was in 2019, when Escalon beat Hilmar 41-27 for the Division VI crown.
“You gotta run the gauntlet,” Beam smiled as he talked about Hilmar. “You run the gauntlet in the TVL and you run the gauntlet again in the playoffs. There are no tricks anymore. We all know what we’re going to do. It’s just going to be playing fault-free football.”
Escalon, which has won eight straight games, wasn’t perfect early on, but played a flawless second half while outscoring Ripon 17-0.
Leading the way was bruising junior fullback Ryker Peters, who had 103 yards and a 44-yard touchdown run by halftime. On a 59-yard, 6-minute drive that ended with 9 minutes, 9 seconds left in the game, he converted two short third-downs, the second a 3-yard touchdown run to give the Cougars a 27-10 lead and essentially a trip to the final.
“He’s blossoming into the Escalon fullback mold,” said Beam of Peters, who finished with 143 yards. “The guy that is going to punish people on runs, finish going downhill and it’s taken him a little bit of time to learn that position but my goodness, he’s figured it out.”
The defense, meanwhile, kept the Indians out of the end zone.
Ripon’s first drive went 15 plays for 75 yards but stalled inside the Escalon 5-yard-line and the Indians had to settle for a field goal. On their subsequent drives, they were forced to punt twice, turned the ball over on downs twice and were intercepted twice.
The only Ripon touchdown came on a Jack Manning 75-yard punt return that gave Ripon a brief 10-7 lead before Peters’ long TD run put the Cougars ahead for good.
“They out-physicaled us up front, bottom line,” Ripon coach Chris Musseman said. “We came out a little on fire in the first quarter. Our kids were just having a hard time with the physical part of the game between the tackles. We are a run-first team and when you take that away, it’s hard for us to move the ball consistently.”
Still, Escalon led only 17-10 at intermission, and talked about missed opportunities in the locker room.
“When we came into halftime and sat there in silence and looked at each other ... we knew we weren’t playing to our capabilities,” Peters said. “We knew we had to do better and it was just a matter of making that change.”
Ripon (8-5) opened the second half with energy, moving the ball quickly with a couple of big gainers when on third-and-7, quarterback Adam Barrera, making only his third start, was picked off by Tyler Medina.
Escalon had the ball on the Ripon 45-yard line. They drove to the Ripon 20, where Alfonzo Gonzalez converted a clutch 39-yard field goal to put Escalon ahead 20-10.
“He’s blossomed into a heck of a football player,” Beam said of Gonzalez. “He made some big-time kicks for us.”
After Ripon’s next drive ended with an incomplete pass on fourth-and-2, Escalon put the game away with the help of Peters and two crucial Indian penalties.
On third-and-6, Ripon was flagged for encroachment, and Peterson easily converted the third-and-1. On third-and-8, quarterback Donovan Rozevink hit E.J. Lewis on a 17-yard pass play. As Lewis fought for extra yardage, a Ripon player grabbed his face mask. The additional 15 yards gave Escalon a first-and-10 on the Ripon 23, and four plays later, Peters ran it in from the 3.
“I felt like our defense is the best defense in the league,” Beam said. “They’ve kind of gone under the radar, which is strange because they’ve been our backbone all year long. We just had to settle in.”
This story was originally published November 20, 2021 at 1:11 AM.
