Stanislaus District’s Got Talent: Intensity in the air on verge of league title

Featured player: Liam Pecchenino

Pecchenino is one of the recurring players featured in this seasonlong series. Before he was a track and field athlete at Fresno State, he was a two-year varsity player at safety, tight end and linebacker. He contributed on special teams and on defense, tallying 16 tackles and one sack his senior season at Central Catholic. He now teaches government and economics and coaches Central Catholic’s freshman team.

Revenge and then some

Oakdale was the last stop on the 2015 Central Catholic football regular season revenge tour.

In the past two seasons, the Raiders had lost only three varsity games, and they all came in 2014: St. Mary’s, Sierra and Oakdale.

Central Catholic visited two of the three tour stops already. They beat St. Mary’s 36-22 in their second game of the season and made quick work of Sierra two weeks prior to the Oakdale game, winning 51-0.

Beating those three teams was all the team wanted to do, Pecchenino said.

“I lost three games in my high school career and they were all in my junior year,” he said reflecting on the 2014 season. “And Oakdale was the only game where we just got beat. Oakdale that junior year, it was bad. We got beat on pretty good and we didn’t play well.”

If you ask members of that 2015 team what the goal for the season was, you’ll get two answers, Pecchenino said.

“Half the team would say we wanted to win every game no matter what, we wanted to be champions. The other half would tell you we wanted to beat Oakdale. We could have went 1-9 but if the one was against Oakdale that year … ” ,he said, trailing off, implying that all would be forgiven if the Raiders beat the Mustangs.

They heard it all for a year. The trash talk from high school students, adults and younger kids. Pecchenino maybe got it even worse. He’s an Oakdale kid.

Playing for a lot

The Raiders and Mustangs knew what was on the line Friday night: whoever won was the VOL champion. And for the loser? Second place.

It was the regular season finale, so playoff seeding also was on the line. The winner was a lock for the top seed in the Sac-Joaquin Section Division III bracket, and whoever fell short locked up the No. 2 seed.

Both teams entered undefeated, boasting 9-0 overall records without a loss in league play.

Central Catholic dominated the first half, holding Oakdale scoreless in the first quarter and opening up a 28-10 advantage after two quarters. But the Mustangs didn’t go away quietly.

Oakdale scored 13 points in the third, 14 in the fourth and allowed only 14 total Central Catholic second-half points as the Mustangs nearly staged a comeback, ruined Central’s perfect season and secured a league title in one half of play.

“There’s people that love that program and there’s people that hate that program, but you gotta respect them,” Pecchenino said. “They just never quit. It doesn’t matter what the score is. They hit at all three levels. That’s the way you’re raised to do it out there.”

It was a game full of second-half twists and turns, one of which nearly cost the Raiders. Justin Rice rushed for 288 yards and three touchdowns but fumbled when they were marching to put the game away. Oakdale recovered, marched down to score, making it a one-score game, then recovered the ensuing onside kick with two or three minutes left.

Central Catholic forced a fourth down and then, with the game on the line, Rice made a redemption play.

“He actually leaves his guy, sees that a guy comes open, and picks it off,” Pecchenino said. “If he doesn’t leave his guy, whoever the (Oakdale) guy is catches it, falls into the end zone and they take the lead with two minutes left.”

The Raiders sealed the game with a late-down conversion that came down to a measurement. They moved the chains by about half a football length.

“It ended up being an amazing football game, an absolutely amazing football game,” Pecchenino said.

Finishing off the rest of league

Fans walking into the stadium that night knew where the people next to them aligned. Raiders fans in blue, gold and white and Mustangs fans in red and yellow.

They don’t know what the attendance was, but Pecchenino says it felt like the entire cities of Oakdale and Modesto were on the Central Catholic campus. Fans lined the fence, people entered through gates opened on opposite ends of the stadium. Even coach Roger Canepa said it was the most people he ever saw at a Central home game.

They all saw a game for the ages.

“It was one of those games where you’re upset there’s a loser as a neutral fan,” Pecchenino said. “But there were no neutral fans in the stadium that day.”

The final sound of the buzzer, fans cheering and team postgame huddle marked the end of a 10-game grind with no midseason break after having its bye in Week 1.

They struggled during some quarters, but more often than not, they dominated their opponents. They may have lost a few short battles, but they won the war and did so without a blemish. A perfect 10-0 overall and 7-0 Valley Oak League record after playing 10 straight weeks of football was nothing to gloss over.

“You go from people telling you that you can’t compete in that league to your second year you win it outright,” Pecchenino said.

This story was originally published December 15, 2025 at 10:07 AM.

Quinton Hamilton

The Modesto Bee

Quinton Hamilton covers high school sports for The Modesto Bee. He is a Southern California native and received his bachelor’s degree from Pacific Union College and a master’s in journalism from Quinnipiac University in Connecticut. Quinton has worked at the Record-Journal in Meriden and helped on projects at Hearst Connecticut.