FORESTVILLE — Rain, mud and cold did ground El Molino”s high-powered passing attack on Saturday night as the Lions hosted the Kelseyville Knights in the first round of the North Coast Section Division IV football playoffs at El Molino High School.
Unfortunately for Kelseyville, that turned out to be the bad news.
Chet Lambert rushed for a career-best 125 yards and three touchdowns and backfield mate Tommy Krausmann added 185 yards as the Lions made the most of seven Kelseyville turnovers and also blocked a punt to win 35-0, the first home playoff victory in El Molino history.
“I was actually praying for rain. I thought rainy conditions would favor us,” Kelseyville coach Rob Ishihara said. “But the turnovers were the difference. They were better in the wet conditions than we were.”
El Molino didn”t commit a single turnover while Kelseyville lost five fumbles, threw two interceptions and had a punt blocked.
“They got a short field on most of their scores,” Ishihara said. “They started on our side of the 50 most of the time.”
The game was scoreless after one quarter and the Knights were still in the game at halftime trailing only 14-0.
Quarterback Mike Pierson, who entered play with 1,554 passing yards and 16 TDs, had his worst game of the season while completing only 3 of 13 passes for 54 yards. Fortunately the Lions” running game, of which Pierson played a part, picked up the necessary slack. Pierson”s 1-yard sneak opened the scoring in the second quarter and Lambert later added 20-yard run, Krausmann rushing for the conversion to make it 14-0.
The Lions pushed their lead to 28-0 in the third quarter on Lambert”s second and third TDs of the game, runs of 20 and 65 yards.
Taylor Davis capped the scoring with a 2-yard plunge in the fourth quarter.
Kelseyville”s defense did record six sacks and Ishihara said the unit played well enough, especially in the early going.
“But the turnovers just killed us,” he added.
While 12th-seeded Kelseyville, the third-place team out of the North Central League I North this season, wraps up the year at 7-4, fifth-seeded El Molino (7-4), the third-place team out of the Sonoma County League, advances to the semifinals on Saturday against No. 4 Middletown (10-1) at Middletown. Kickoff is 7 p.m.
“All of our losses were to playoff teams,” Ishihara said in reviewing his first season as the Knights” head coach. “Our youth program had a lot of success this year, so I would say we are in good shape.”
Middletown, Fort Bragg and Kelseyville, the top three teams in the NCL I North this season, all take major graduation hits in the offseason and Ishihara believes the 2011 NCL I race will be a good one.
“We will miss our seniors,” Ishihara said. “The senior class is very athletic. But hopefully with another year in our system, we”ll continue to have success.”
The Knights do return a 1,000-yard rusher next season. Junior running back Geno Poloni entered play against El Molino with 920 yards and finished with 87 on 17 carries to become the second Kelseyville player this season to reach 1,000, joining senior Nick Rodrigues, who had 56 yards on 10 carries against the Lions. He finishes with 1,189 yards.
