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Aptos gave St. Francis all it could handle for three quarters. But the fourth quarter was all Lancers as they doubled up the visitors, scoring four unanswered touchdowns to pull away for a 56-28 victory in a Central Coast Section Division I quarterfinal matchup Friday in Mountain View.
No. 1 seed St. Francis (10-0) advances to play host to Menlo-Atherton, a 35-31 winner over Salinas, in the semifinals.
Aptos (8-2) was the aggressor at the game’s outset, recovering a fumble on the opening kickoff and scoring a touchdown on a 39-yard pass on the game’s first play from scrimmage.
“They did a fantastic job,” St. Francis coach Greg Calcagno said. “They came out and punched us in the mouth and gave us a tough time.”
A 27-yard run by Viliami (JuJu) Teu tied it, and the teams settled into a pattern in which each offense seemed to pretty much do as it pleased
The score was 14-14 after one quarter and 21-21 until late in the second quarter when Josh Perry’s first completed pass of the game went for a 9-yard touchdown to Andrew Adkison to give St. Francis a 28-21 lead at halftime.
Aptos took the second-half kickoff and went on a 16-play drive that took 7:35 off the clock and knotted the score up again at 28-28.
The Lancers needed to respond and did so with a 14-play drive of their own that ended on Camilo Arquette’s 2-yard touchdown run.
That’s when the St. Francis defense came alive. Aptos went for it on fourth and 5 from its own 25 and Padraic Casey put a hit on the Aptos quarterback as he threw, forcing an incompletion and a turnover on downs.
St. Francis took over and — boom — Teu went 40 yards for a touchdown on the first play.
Aptos went four and out again and — boom — Teu went 26 yards on the first play for another touchdown and a 49-28 lead.
The next time the Lancers got the ball the subs came in and again it took only one play to score as backup running back Aven Pamintuan raced 65 yards to make it a 28-point fourth quarter and the 56-28 final margin.
After his record-setting 344-yard performance last week against Serra, Teu added another in the string of great games that has come to define his senior season. He carried 24 times for 257 yards and scored five touchdowns.
“This line is unbelievable,” Teu said. “Every week when I run behind them I have no doubt that I’m going to score.”
Arquette added another 101 yards on 12 carries as the Lancers rushed for a school-record 438 yard and scored eight touchdowns on eight possessions.
Last week St. Francis scored five touchdowns and kicked three field goals on its eight possessions. Calcagno was asked when was the last time you punted?
“I don’t know,” he said with a laugh. “That’s something I don’t want to remember.”
But for all the offensive fireworks, the defense coming to life in the fourth quarter was the deciding factor.
“We made some adjustments,” Casey said.
“At halftime we talked about how we needed to play to survive,” said senior defensive back Nicolas Andrighetto. “After that we locked down. We moved our strong safeties down and shut down their outside run game.”
