Walker pick-six pushes Los Banos football back into the DIV semifinals

It hasn’t been the senior year David Walker had hoped for.

After a breakout 2014, the wide receiver was expected to shine in a high-powered Los Banos offense this season. It didn’t come to pass as inconsistency and nagging injuries saw him catch only 18 passes during the regular season.

The postseason offers opportunity for new life, however. He took full advantage of it in Friday night’s Sac-Joaquin Section Division IV first-round game with Lathrop. Walker produced seven tackles, two sacks and a pick-six that proved the game winner in a wild 30-29 upset of top-seeded Lathrop.

The No. 8 Tigers will travel to No. 4 Liberty Ranch next Friday for a semifinal showdown.

“It hasn’t gone the way I thought it would,” Walker said. “When I got in the end zone, I was so happy I almost cried.

“We didn’t make it easy on ourselves, but it was great to get a win and put the last couple weeks behind us. We let people know that the end of the season was just a hiccup and we’re back on the right track.”

Walker’s 13-yard interception return put the Tigers up 30-21 with 3:10 to play, but nothing has come easy for Los Banos (7-4) the last month of the season.

Lathrop (6-5) showed the form that helped earn them the No. 1 seed, storming back into the game.

The Spartans produced just 67 yards of total offense in the opening half, but got its passing game going after the break. Quarterback Diego Chavez completed 16 of 31 passes after the break for 222 yards and a pair of touchdowns.

His final completion was a 35-yard touchdown pass that trimmed the lead to 30-27 with 1:44 to play. A bad snap cost the Spartans the ensuing extra point, leaving it a three-point game. That one point would prove pivotal as LB recovered the ensuing onside kick.

A holding call forced the Tigers to an unconventional three-and-out that still managed to chew up the bulk of the clock with the ball at their own 39-yard line. The Lathrop coaching staff opted to let Los Banos run the clock down to 7.1 seconds, saving its final timeout for the last drive.

Instead of punting, Tigers coach Dustin Caropreso put his faith in his senior quarterback. He instructed Adam Herrera to sprint for his own end zone and run out the final seven seconds before conceding a safety. An untouched blitzing Spartan almost upset everything, but Herrera managed to win the sprint and stall long enough to run out the clock.

“Adam looked at me like I was crazy when I told him the plan,” Caropreso said. “I told him no matter what happened, he had to get to the end zone. They almost got him for a second, but he came through.

“It’s the greatest 30-yard loss in the history of the program.”

The wild final play was a fitting end to a contest with no shortage of twists and turns.

It was a nightmare start for the Tigers as Herrera fumbled on the opening possession and Lathrop pounced on the short field with a Chavez 11-yard TD pass to take a 6-0 lead.

It was the same formula that saw LB lose three of its last four games to close the regular season, but Caropreso’s squad shrugged the poor start off.

“That’s what we’ve been waiting for all season,” Caropreso said. “We easily could have thought ‘here we go again,’ and put our heads down. But for the first time, the kids didn’t let that bother them.”

The Tigers closed the first half with an Ignacio Olivares 33-yard field goal and a 10-yard touchdown pass from Herrera to Anthony Machado to take a 9-6 lead into intermission.

The Tigers threatened to break the game open in the third.

Daniel Fernandez (nine carries, 74 yards) broke an 18-yard TD run on LB’s first possession of the second half and a botched snap on a Spartan punt set Herrera up for a 17-yard touchdown pass to Kevin Spencer that made it 23-6 less than a minute later.

Caropreso hoped an inexperienced Lathrop squad might fold, but the Spartans stormed back. A couple touchdowns trimmed the lead to 23-21 with just under six minutes to play.

Walker’s score helped ensure the Spartans never got back in front, however.

“He needed this game,” Caropreso said of Walker. “We’d been telling him all week that big players step up in big games. He definitely did that tonight.”

This story was originally published November 14, 2015 at 6:57 AM with the headline "Walker pick-six pushes Los Banos football back into the DIV semifinals."