Kellis senior quarterback Ronald Coty III stepped back in the pocket and hit fellow senior Nathan Macias in stride up the middle and the Cougars led 7-0 some 80 yards later.

It was the first play of the game and it took only 13 seconds off the clock. Coty would leave the game in the fourth quarter with five  passes and a 49-7 victory at Oro Valley Ironwood Ridge in the first round of the 5A playoffs.

Kellis made the postseason six times in program history dating back to 2007 and this was the first playoff victory for the Cougars.

"We knew they couldn't match our tempo Once we scored that first touchdown, we knew it was over with," Coty said. "We knew this wasn't going to be a walkover though. We had to lock in and be prepared and take advantage of what we happened."

No. 12 Kellis (10-1) will travel to play at disrict rival No. 4 Cactus (8-3) in the quarterfinal round after the Cobras beat No. 13 Mountain View 42-13 to set up the game next Friday night.

No. 5 Ironwood Ridge fell to 8-3 on the year with back-to-back losses for the first time in the three years after head coach Dale Stott turned a 1-9 program into a playoff contender.

Likewise, Cougar head coach Ben Kullos inherited a program that went 1-27 in the three years prior to his arrival and he turned it into a contender with a 29-11 record since 2021.

At 9-1 at the end of the regular season, the Cougars might have been a bit underrated and, had there been no Open Division, Kellis would have earned a No. 16 seed.

Coty made it 14-0 on a 76-yard pass to Macias with 7:26 left in the first quarter but the Nighthawks came right back with a 23-yard strike from Hunter Rehrmann to Matthew Kroner to cut the lead down to 14-7 with 6:39 left.

It looked like the Nighthawks were back in the game at that point but Coty made it 21-7 on a 31-yard score to David Bedolla two minutes later.

Rehrmann replaced injured QB Jaiden Martinez and the Nighthawks also lost the services of Grant Dooling early on. Then junior linebacker Rocky Warner putting the Cougars up 28-7 on a 24-yard interception return with 10:50 left in the half.

Coty hit Bedolla from 46 yards to make it 35-7 with 9:38 left in the half and Coty picked up his fifth TD pass on a two-yard toss to Avery Rodriguez to make it 42-7 with 2:24 left.

Rodriguez would run the ball in from four yards out to make it 49-7 with 8:22 left in the third quarter and substitutions and a running clock out an end to the scoring at that point.

"It's a great group of guys. We put in work all summer, and all offseason. We've been waiting for this moment and we took advantage of it," Coty said.

Andy Morales and his brother, Javier, are the foremost sportswriters in Tucson. Read their work on AllSports Tucson and more of Andy's stories at AZPreps365.