Dating back to the regular season, St. Joseph has won seven straight contests, including Friday night’s quarterfinal win at Visalia Redwood, 28-21.
The Knights started the scoring on a trick play. They ran a reverse with Mark Crisp finding senior quarterback Hunter Barnhart in the endzone.
Devin Guggia, a junior, then ran in a score from seven yards out to put St. Joseph up 14-0.
A score with 23 seconds left before halftime finally saw Redwoods get on the scoreboard, but a score by St. Joseph in its first possession of the second half gave them a 21-7 advantage.
Guggia would score his third rushing touchdown of the night to put the Knights up 28-7 with just 3:21 remaining in the fourth quarter.
The Rangers would score two touchdowns before ultimately failing to recover the onside kick allowing the Knights to run the clock out in the final possession and win the game by a touchdown.
With the win, St. Joseph (9-3) will play at Fresno San Joaquin Memorial (11-1) in the semifinals of the CIF-SS Division 2 playoffs.
Memorial High won the CIF-SS Division 3 championship last season.
8-MAN FOOTBALL
FLINTRIDGE 35, CATE 25
For the second time this season, Flintridge Prep was able to defeat Cate school, defeating them 35-25 in the second round of the CIF-SS Division 1 playoffs.
The Rebels started the scoring early, finiding the endzone twice in the first quarter to take a 14-0 lead.
Cate would respond with a passing score with 5:58 remaining in the first quarter to keep pace, but Flintridge again scored to go up 21-7 by the end of the first.
The Rebels were up 28-7 before sophomore quarterback Will Bouma threw his second touchdown of the half to put his team back within two scores.
In the third quarter, Bouma threw another two touchdown passes, both to Scott Holmes to bring the Rams even closer. Three missed PAT’s on the day for Cate made the score 28-25 in favor of Flintridge despite both teams scoring four touchdowns.
The Rebels would find the endzone one more time in the fourth quarter and then play lockdown defense the rest of the way to advance to the semifinals and end the Rams season.
Email: Jmercado@newspress.com
