By Mark Carlisle
Twitter: @mwcarlisle

Mountain Ridge cruised to its first 6A Southwest Section win Friday, beating Valley Vista 63-22 in a pass-happy game on both sides of the ball.

Mountain Ridge (3-2, 1-1) jumped on Valley Vista (2-3, 0-1), going up 14-0 in less than two minutes and 21-0 in less than six minutes. The Monsoon hung around, cutting the lead to 28-14 in the second quarter, but never really threatened the Mountain Lions’ lead.

Mountain Ridge coach Doug Madoski was glad to see his team start hot after scoring just 7 first-half points in the last two games compared to 48 second-half points.

“We started better. Offensively, obviously, we’ve struggled scoring points in the first half, and I think we made that a point of emphasis for us is we needed to start the way we’d finished in other games and sustain drives and go out and do some things,” Madoski said.

Madoski said the challenge Friday was trying to keep his players focused when they’re leading, too, so they don’t give the opponent a way to get back into the game.

“We’re too high, we’re too low. Sooner or later, we’ve got to even-keel this thing a little bit,” Madoski said.

The Mountain Lion passing attack blew away the Monsoon defense, totaling 297 passing yards and seven touchdowns on 18 for 28 passing with no interceptions. The bulk of that, 189 yards and five touchdowns, came from starter Brendan Anderson, a sophomore. Junior Ryan Finch took over under center midway through the third quarter and added 108 yards and two touchdowns on just six pass attempts.

Valley Vista featured two quarterbacks for another reason. Starter Burton DeLay, a senior, was trying to play through a shoulder injury but took a hit on the third play from scrimmage that knocked him out of the game. Valley Vista coach Josh Sekoch said DeLay’s injury status was day-to-day moving forward.

Senior Luke Killinger took over from the Monsoon’s second possession on and performed well despite the loss. Killinger threw for 237 yards and three touchdowns with one interception, completing 20 of 32 attempts. He also accounted for 79 of the team’s 99 rushing yards.

Killinger is not just new under center but new to Valley Vista, as he just transferred in from Oregon two weeks ago. Sekoch said Killinger did a great job Friday and was impressed with his ability to step in as a senior at a new school and lead.

Friday’s loss wasn’t who a matter of which quarterback was under center, Sekoch said, but that his defense allowed 63 points.

“It was our defense tonight. It wasn’t Luke Killinger or Burt DeLay. Our secondary continues to struggle, and they have a great passing game. That quarterback’s really good,” he said.

Despite the high volume of pass attempts on each side, there were only one sack and one interception in the game, both from the Mountain Lions. Senior safety Jared Baker had the sack and senior linebacker Deryk Leverage had the pick.

Mountain Ridge senior safety Tanor Loosie had the defensive play of the day. After being pinned by a punt, Valley Vista fumbled a snap from the 2-yard line and Loosie fell on it in the end zone for a defensive score.

Mountain Ridge sophomore Shannon Coulter went from not being targeted in the first half to the Lions top receiver in the game on just two catches, 43- and 40- yard touchdown catches from Finch for 83 receiving yards. Senior Simeon Nicholson also had two touchdowns and caught three total passes for 53 yards.

Junior Rahim Bagley led the Lions’ run game but was mostly bottled up except for two big plays — a 61-yard touchdown run and a 41-yard catch-and-run for another score. He finished with 85 rushing yards on 10 attempts.

Sophomore Sam Thielen and senior Tyler Strow also caught touchdowns for Mountain Ridge.

Killinger was locked into just one target early on. Sophomore Blaise Nelson was targeted on 11 of Killinger’s first 18 passes, catching 10 of his first 11 completions, including both of his first-half touchdowns, and accounting for all but 8 of Killinger’s first 132 passing yards. Nelson finished with 13 catches for 151 yards.

Killinger spread it around a little more in the second half and connected with senior Maddox Lawien for a touchdown.

Trailing early, the Monsoon were forced to throw a lot, but they also turned to the air because they couldn’t get anything done on the ground outside of Killinger’s scrambles and QB draws. Their two running backs, juniors Dylan Hoyt and Meven Obregon combined for just 20 rushing yards on 12 carries.

Valley Vista attempted two-point conversions after all three touchdowns, converting two of them.

Injury

Mountain Ridge starting center Justin Ritter limped off the field with an injury in the fourth quarter and was still limping immediately after the game. Madoski said the center had a sprained ankle but expected he’d be fine for next week.

Hot start

The Mountain Lions’ two touchdowns in under two minutes to start the game came despite the Monsoon receiving the opening kickoff. The Mountain Ridge defense forced a three-and-out and the offense scored on its first play from scrimmage — a 37-yard Anderson-to-Nicholson pass.

On the ensuing kickoff, Mountain Ridge sophomore Jacob Kelley forced and recovered a fumble to give the Lions the ball on the Monsoon 12-yard line. It took the Lions three plays to score, on a 10-yard pass from Anderson to Strow, to go up 14-0 with 10:03 on the clock.

Mountain Ridge did not take the foot off the gas and Leverage recovered the team’s onside kick on the ensuing kickoff. The Lions did not score on that drive but a tipped punt gave them the ball 32 yards from the goal line on the next possession. They scored in two plays, Anderson to Nicholson again, to go up 21-0 with 6:17 on the clock in the first quarter.

Penalties

The Monsoon hung around thanks in part to Mountain Lion penalties, which helped sustain several of Valley Vista’s drives. Mountain Ridge conceded 94 penalty yards in the first half, compared to 146 first-half offensive yards for Valley Vista.

Madoski said some penalties are part of football but they need to avoid unnecessary mental mistakes costing them at inopportune times.

Things got chippy at times, including a scrum after the whistle on a play in the third quarter that involved multiple players from each team and an official getting knocked to the ground. Players on each team got unsportsmanlike conduct penalties and a Mountain Ridge player was ejected for coming onto the field from the sideline.

Mark Carlisle
Associate Editor | Phoenix
@mwcarlisle

mcarlisle@iniusa.org

Meet Mark

Mark Carlisle joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in 2017, covering Glendale. He has since moved to the Daily Independent team, primarily covering the city of Phoenix along with other topics affecting the Valley at-large.

Community: Mark enjoys taking his young son to BabyTime at the Phoenix Public Library, to the OdySea Aquarium and to various sporting events around the Valley.

Education: Chapman University with a BA in English Journalism and one in Screenwriting.

Random Fact: Mark worked at a tuxedo shop in college. Just don’t ask him to tie a bowtie.

 

Hobbies: Spending time with his wife, son and dog, watching sports and TV shows, listening to audiobooks and occasionally writing fiction or designing a board game.