Honkers' playoff hopes still alive

The Yuba City High football team took a lead, shot itself in the foot, left the door wide open, shut it, then opened it again, until finally edging Pioneer 22-20 at home on Friday.

In other words, it was typical Honker football.

"We do some really good things, and then we shoot ourselves in the foot," Ithurburn said.

On Friday, however, the Honkers did enough good things to keep their slim playoff hopes alive.

The Honkers (4-5, 2-2) need Woodland (5-4, 2-2) to lose back-to-back games, one of which must be a narrow win by Pioneer, if they are to make the Sac-Joaquin Section playoffs.

"It's a point-differential thing," Ithurburn said.

Which explains why Honkers quarterback Justin Crook continued to hurl balls down the field to his standout wideouts Kevin Noall and Durrel Buchanan in the closing seconds up by two.

"I talked to the Pioneer coaches at the end of the game. They understood what we were doing and had no problem with it," Ithurburn said.

If the Honkers closed the game the way they opened it, they probably would have let the score alone.

Crook found Buchanan twice on their opening drive of the game, including a second pass which Buchanan tipped to himself, hauled it in and outran defenders down the sidelines for a 50-yard gain before accidentally stepping out of bounds at the Patriots' 6-yard line.

Dragos Simeon punched it in on the ensuing play and the Honkers took an initial 7-0 lead.

The Honkers rode Simeon for 80 yards on 25 carries. Meanwhile, the Patriots used seven different ball carriers in the first half, one of which was Kalin Carlos, who knotted up the score at 7 after dancing his way in from 30 yards out just before the end of the first quarter.

Crook was picked off by Alex Silva early in the third quarter, but Pioneer (5-4, 2-2) coughed up the ball on its next play from scrimmage, and the Honkers capitalized with their longest drive of the game, if not the season.

Eighteen plays later, Crook found Buchanan over the middle. The wideout made a couple of defenders miss, dashed up the middle and scored from 12 yards out to cap off the 73-yard drive.

The two teams went into the locker room tied at 13 after Pioneer's Martin Galindo scored from four yards out.

Buchanan finished with seven catches for 116 yards and the touchdown, while Noall caught three passes for 50 yards and corralled an interception. James Haymore, who recorded two sacks and another tackle for a loss on defense, hauled in a 34-yard pass from Crook to help set up a quarterback sneak, giving the Honkers a 19-13 advantage.

Yuba City took a two-possession lead after Noall kicked a 25-yard field goal with 10 minutes remaining, but Pioneer remained in the game.

Pioneer quarterback Pat Colin responded with a 60-yard pass to James Tillman, and although Buchanan clearly had an interception on the play, the ball popped out of his hands and into Tillman's. One play later, Alex Fernandez punched it in to bring the score to 22-20.

The Honkers looked to tack on points down the stretch, but allowed Pioneer to threaten a couple of times. However, defensive plays by Jack Kirby, Trevor Moffis, Haymore, Noall and Buchanan sealed the win.