State champs prevail

Sept. 17, 2006

By DARRELL L. BREESE/ Frontiersman

PALMER - Whatever Juneau-Douglas head football coach Bill Chalmers told his team during halftime on Friday worked.

After falling behind to the host Colony Knights, and losing starting wide receiver Jesse West, who was carted off in an ambulance, the Crimson Bears dominated the final two quarters, and came from behind to score a 22-13 win over the Alaska Sports Broadcasting Network's top-ranked team.

Juneau did it mostly on defense, but also with a little help from the Knights.

&#8220They played like the defending state champions,” Colony head coach Jamie Mayo said. &#8220And we didn't play like the No. 1 team in the state.”

So what was the secret message Chalmers used to inspire his team, that was trailing 13-7, when it went to the locker room?

&#8220Coach just told us to play together as a team” Juneau defensive end Faifo Levale said. &#8220We weren't doing that, and Colony was able to get their offense going.”

Refocused after giving up a pair of first-half touchdowns, the Juneau defense capitalized on a series of Colony penalties to set up a momentum-swinging play.

The Knights - whistled for an illegal block in the back, illegal procedure, delay of game, and offensive pass interference on its first possession of the second half - faced a 4th-and-49 play from its own 18-yard line.

Colony punter Xavier Irwin took the snap at the 5-yard line and kicked the ball into the chest of Juneau linebacker Alex Robinson, who slipped through a gap in the line. Levale swept in from his defensive end position to scoop up the loose ball and stumble into the end zone for a touchdown.

&#8220That really changed the game,” Mayo said. &#8220I told the kids all week that Juneau liked to come up the middle and try to block punts. They did it against North Pole, we saw it on tape. In fact the same kid scored on that block.”

The combination of the blocked punt and the loss of starting quarterback Teddy Babcock, who was injured on the second play of the half, knocked the mental focus of the Knights out of whack.

&#8220We just never recovered from that,” Mayo said. &#8220Now we have a chink in our armor and will have to work to get back to the level of intensity Juneau showed tonight.”

The Crimson Bears capped a 69-yard drive with a 1-yard touchdown run by quarterback Chris Hinkley at the start of the fourth quarter. Hinkley connected on a pass to Carlo Ebron for the two-point conversion to give the Bears a 9-point lead.

That meant the Knights would need two scores for the victory.

With Babcock sidelined, back-up quarterback Brad Truax failed to lead the Colony offense back into the end zone.

That's something Mayo credited to the Juneau defense.

&#8220I said that they were going to put a bunch of bodies at the line of scrimmage, and that is just what they did,” Mayo said. &#8220We weren't able to back them off of the line, and that resulted in a lot of pressure up the middle on every play.”

In addition to being the first team to beat the Knights this season, Juneau did something no other team had been able to accomplish in 2006. They forced Colony to play from behind for the first time, after Hinkley threw a 38-yard touchdown to Ebron in the first quarter.

The shock of being behind didn't have much of an impact on Mike Zagars, who returned the ensuing kick-off 100 yards for a touchdown. A big block from Robin Minoza helped Zagars get to the end zone.

&#8220I thought we had them on their heels after the first touchdown,” Hinkley said. &#8220But they came right back at us. That kick return took away any momentum we had.”

Minoza later tied up Juneau running back Nate Wilson long enough for teammate Ryan Coffman to strip the ball away, halting a Bears scoring threat on the Colony 18-yard line.

The game was delayed for more than a half-hour after the turnover, while officials waited for an ambulance to arrive to tend to West, who according to Colony coaches suffered a compound fracture.

Once the game resumed, the Knights managed to put together a late drive, ending with a scoring 32-yard screen pass from Babcock to tailback Chebon Jimenez. That gave the Knights a 13-7 lead at the half. But Juneau proved to be the better team in the second half, ending the Knights reign as the top ranked team in the

state.

This season the top ranking has been a recipe for disaster. The Bartlett Golden Bears lost to East in week 2 of the season after moving to the top spot. Juneau fell to Palmer two weeks ago after they claimed the No. 1 ranking. Now the Knights have lost after moving up to the top of the ASBN charts.

The Juneau victory, combined with Palmer's 48-13 triumph over West Valley, creates the possibility of a three-way log jam for the top spot in the Railbelt Conference. With four conference wins, Juneau currently holds a half-game advantage, with one Railbelt Conference game to go.

Juneau is 5-1 overall and 4-1 in conference, the Knights and Palmer are both 3-1, with a pair of conference games remaining.

&#8220If things end up like they are now, we're in a three way tie for the conference title,” Mayo said. &#8220But if we fail to win our next two, we could drop to third or fourth.”

Contact Darrell L. Breese at 352-2267 or at darrell.breese@

frontiersman.com.