The Pine Raiders opened district action last week on the road at St Helena with a hard fought 23-22 district win over the Hawks. The Raiders will play the Northlake Christian Wolverines this week at home.
The Raiders got on the board first as their defense scored a safety to go up 2-0. The Raiders added to that score when Braxton Newman scored on the kickoff return. The extra point put the Raiders up 9-0 early in the first.
The Raiders added another touchdown on their next drive when Brayson Pittman scored from 31 yards out to put the Raiders up 16-0 with 7:37 left in the first period.
The Hawks then made a comeback as they scored on a four yard quarterback run with 7:54 left in the second to close the gap to 16-6. After forcing a Raider punt the Hawks drove 95 yards to score again when their back went in from 20 yards out. The two point conversion was good and the score stood at 16-14 with just :51 left in the first half. The Raiders had a pass intercepted as they were attempting to score before the half and the 16-14 score stood at the intermission.
Neither team threatened in the third period but the Raiders increased their lead in the beginning of the fourth as quarterback Cooper Thomas went in from five yards out. The extra point made the score 23-14. The Hawks answered on the ensuing drive as their rangy quarterback tossed a pass into the endzone for a fifteen yard touchdown with 7:00 left in the game. Their two point conversion was good and they were within one point at 23-22.
The Hawks then recovered an onside kick and drove to the Raiders 10 yard line before fumbling over to the Raiders there.
The Raiders were forced to punt with 1:13 left in the game but the Raiders defense held the Hawks as the clock ran out giving the Raiders a nice district win.
Pine coach Bradley Seal said the Raiders followed their game plan to get the win. "It was a little closer than we thought it would be at the start of the game. Defensively they ran the ball better than we expected. But we never gave up the big play and that was our plan. Offensively we seemed a little off all night but we were able to run the ball late in the game to run the clock. Overall, we did what we needed to do to win the game and I'm proud of our team for getting the win."
