UPPER LAKE — Eight turnovers and a heavy dose of Chris Dahl sent the Upper Lake Cougars to their first loss of the season, a 34-10 setback to the Fort Bragg Timberwolves during a North Central League I interlock varsity football game on Saturday afternoon in Upper Lake.
Dahl, Fort Bragg”s standout running back, rushed for 220 yards on 13 carries, including touchdown runs of 76, 5 and 18 yards as the Timberwolves improved to 2-0 on the season.
As good a day as Dahl enjoyed, Upper Lake quarterback James Eubanks probably wished he could have called it an afternoon after the first play of the second quarter. The senior, a first-year varsity starter, completed his first four passes for 76 yards, including a 25-yard scoring strike to wide receiver Dalton Steptoe late in the first quarter.
It was all downhill after that for Eubanks, whose final seven pass attempts of the game resulted in six interceptions, four of those picks coming in the second quarter, three by Fort Bragg linebacker Nick Paoli.
“That might be a (school) record,” Fort Bragg coach Jack Moyer said. “I”ve had other guys pick off three passes in game, but never in the same quarter.”
“Mistakes killed us, no doubt about it,” Upper Lake coach Airic Guerrero said. “In the beginning, they (Timberwolves) were doing exactly what we expected, but they made adjustments and we didn”t adjust nearly as well.”
On Paoli”s big day on defense, Guerrero added, “No. 29 was dropping much deeper than I was expecting and he put himself in a good position to pick off those balls.”
“He was right where he was supposed to be,” Moyer said of Paoli, who is one of only five returning starters on this year”s Fort Bragg club.
Upper Lake (1-1) actually had a 10-8 lead early in the second quarter when Luis Santana booted a 26-yard field goal four plays after Robbie Avery picked off a Fort Bragg pass.
The Cougars” didn”t get to savor that lead for very long. After the ensuing kickoff, Dahl burst up the middle on first down, angled his way toward the Fort Bragg sideline and outran the pursuit to the end zone for a 76-yard touchdown and a 16-10 Fort Bragg lead.
Eubanks” third and fourth interceptions of the second quarter led to one-play Fort Bragg scoring drives each time. Dahl scored on a 5-yard run with 4:42 left in the half for a 22-10 lead and quarterback Brent Moyer”s 31-yard pass to Eli Duran with 1:38 remaining made it 28-10.
A fifth Upper Lake turnover in the quarter, this time a fumble, had the Timberwolves knocking on the door again in the final seconds, but Brandon Mendoza picked off a Moyer pass in the end zone.
As bad as things had gone for the Cougars in the first half, they had a chance to work themselves right back into the game in the third quarter, a quarter in which they ran 17 plays to only two for the Timberwolves.
Upper Lake caught a huge break when Dahl, who had nothing but open space between himself and the end zone, lost the handle on the football near the end of a long run. The loose ball rolled into and out of the end zone for a touchback, giving the Cougars possession at their own 20.
Upper Lake then went on a long drive, with running back Antonio DiConza doing nearly all the work. He carried the ball six times for 61 yards, the final carry a 25-yard burst to the Fort Bragg 13. But in the six plays that followed, DiConza didn”t touch the ball even once and the drive ended with Eubanks being picked off by Fort Bragg defensive back Jake Beyer.
Fort Bragg scored an insurance touchdown when Dahl broke loose on an 18-yard run with 3:16 remaining to make it 34-10.
The Timberwolves jumped ahead 8-0 midway through the first quarter on a 3-yard pass from Moyer to Colter Gudmundson. Moyer, who is the son of Fort Bragg”s longtime and successful head coach, then connected with Duran on the conversion.
Upper Lake answered on its next possession, moving 70 yards in eight plays, the final one a beautiful catch by Steptoe, who simply outjumped Fort Bragg defensive back Joseph Roach in the end zone and came down with the ball for a touchdown. It also was a solid play on Eubanks” part as he held his ground under a ferocious pass rush and was leveled after releasing the ball.
“I thought if we could get the ball to Dalton, he could outjump them most of the time,” Guerrero said of Steptoe, who finished with three catches for 64 yards.
Unfortunately for the Cougars, Steptoe wasn”t a factor after the first play of the second quarter, when he made his final reception.
“They blitzed us a lot and we didn”t pick up the blitzes very well,” Guerrero said. “That was part of the problem.”
So were a handful of underthrown passes by Eubanks, who never gave his receivers a chance to make catches on a majority of the balls that ended up being intercepted.
“Most of the mistakes we made are fixable,” Guerrero said. “And we”ll fix them.”
DiConza was a bright spot for the Cougars with 92 yards on 18 carries. Upper Lake plays its homecoming game Saturday against Lower Lake (1-1).
