BREMERTON — Sequim senior Jarrett Allen hauled in the game-sealing interception at the Wolves’ goal line with just over a minute to play to preserve a 22-20 state tournament-clinching win over Franklin Pierce on Friday at Silverdale Stadium.
“The kids answered,” head coach Erik Wiker said. “A lot of kids did things that could have frustrated them and taken them out of the game, but they were very, very resilient. The key word for the game would be resilience because a lot of kids made mistakes and a lot of those same kids made big plays.”
The district playoff win propels Sequim to the 16-team Class 2A State Tournament, the Wolves’ first state appearance since a six-year streak of visits from 2006 to 2011.
“Every time I was out on the field, I was thinking to myself, ‘We aren’t going to lose, we aren’t going to lose any more in the [district] playoffs,” senior Kyler Rollness said.
“The last two years, being part of those teams and getting so close to going to state — we’ve worked hard for this as a team. We’ve worked our butts off as a team to get this far. I don’t think there was anybody in the locker room that didn’t believe we were going to win that game.”
Sequim (9-1) will find out its state foe today when the WIAA’s 1A/2A state seeding committee meets for the first time to seed teams into the state bracket.
Friday night, Franklin Pierce (5-5) went up 13-3 in the first half after the Wolves whiffed on a few plays in pass coverage and allowed 6-foot-2, 215-pound Toney Brown to get loose and score on consecutive pass plays of 88 and 61 yards.
“Defensively we are a couple of inches [away from getting tackles],” Wiker said. “Bad angles on No. 10 [Brown]. An inch here or an inch there.”
“And their guy [quarterback Tagatanuu Faafiti Jr.], out of the blue, has his best passing game ever. If you look at their yards, he probably threw for half their season total tonight. He wasn’t throwing it into the dirt or overthrowing [like in pre-game warmups]. They were right on the money.”
The Wolves’ also made miscues in other aspects — a block in the back took an 80-yard kick return by Rollness off the scoreboard and Rollness dropped a pass in the end zone later that drive as the Wolves turned the ball over on downs near the goal line.
“There wasn’t even that much of a struggle, so much as not executing by a couple of inches,” Wiker said. “We score on the kick return but we shove a guy and don’t score on that drive. There were some regular mistakes — we dropped two touchdown passes [one coming in the second half]. Dropping two TDs on separate drives, the kick return, that’s 21 points.”
Rollness regrouped and came up huge in the second quarter, catching three passes, including an 11-yard touchdown pass, to score the Wolves’ first TD.
Sequim gave up another Cardinals’ TD, this one a 23-yard run by Delaquan Wood, to trail 20-9, but answered before halftime when quarterback Riley Cowan found Joey Oliver on a hitch pattern for about 15 yards along the right sideline. Oliver then lateraled the ball to an oncoming Rollness who sprinted past the defense and in for what amounted to a 54-yard receiving TD and a 20-15 deficit at halftime.
“That was a nice call. We work on that every week and it probably worked better than it works in practice,” Wiker said. “Once or twice a week, but every week, so they’ve run it 15 to 20 times by now at least.”
Rollness led the Wolves with nine catches for 162 yards and two scores.
Wiker said the adjustments were minimal for the second half.
“It was just do your job and do it right, we are only missing by a couple of inches.” Wiker said. “We don’t do that, we score, they don’t and we win. A matter of them settling down and just playing football.”
The Wolves scored the eventual game-winning TD on Cowan’s QB sneak from the 2-yard line late in the third quarter.
A 15-yard completion to Rollness on 3rd-and-5 at midfield extended the drive and senior Keeshawn Whitney came on for his first carry to rumble 34 yards to the 2-yard line to set up the score.
The Wolves recovered a Franklin Pierce fumble at their own 24-yard line and drove down to the Cardinals’ 8-yard line before a Cowan field goal try went high over the goal post and was signaled no good with 6:32 to go in the game.
Franklin Pierce switched quarterbacks for its final drive, inserting backup Claudell Quinland in place of Faafiti, a curious decision considering Faafiti was 6 of 7 for 237 yards and two TDs on the game.
“Maybe they were wanting a more mobile quarterback who could scramble,” Wiker said.
Quinland completed his first three passes for 45 yards as the Cardinals slowly worked downfield as far as the Sequim 34-yard line.
But two great defensive plays pushed Franklin Pierce back to the Sequim 41-yard line.
Walker Ward brought down Cardinals’ running back Willie Coleman for a 3-yard loss on a first-down pitch play.
“Walker got that tackle for loss on that trips bunch, redeemed himself from getting sucked in and crack-back blocked on that rushing TD,” Wiker said.
And Ben Cowan sacked Quinland for a 4-yard loss.
Franklin Pierce went for it all on 3rd-and-long and Allen was there to make the grab and effectively end the game.
“We needed to do our jobs and stay over the guys and that’s what happened,” Allen said.
Wiker was relieved to have the game in the rear-view mirror.
“It was just one of those, ‘Let’s get it all out now before state, right? [kind of games],” he said.
“Very fixable, playing smarter on defense, not making a block in the back away from the play, not being totally out of position just a little tweak, cleaning a little bit up, concentrating and looking that ball in a little more, diving and selling out. That kind of thing.”
Sequim 22, Franklin Pierce 20
Franklin Pierce 13 7 0 0— 20
Sequim 3 12 0 7— 22
First Quarter
S—Cowan 23 field goal
FP—Brown 88 pass from Faafiti (kick failed)
FP—Brown 61 pass from Faafiti (Contreras kick)
Second Quarter
S—Rollness 11 pass from Cowan (pass failed)
FP—Wood 23 run (Contreras kick)
S—Rollness 55 pass from Cowan (pass failed)
Third Quarter
S—Cowan 1 run (Cowan kick)
Individual Stats
Rushing—FP: Woods 13-81, Coleman 8-19, Hinson 3-8, Brown 2-5, Quinland 1-(-4), Faafiti 2-(-19). S: Wiker 24-98, Cowan 8-43, Whitney 3-39, Allen 1-(-3).
Passing—FP: Faafiti 6-7-237, 2 TDs; Quinland 3-4-45, INT. S: Cowan 17-31-211, 2TDs.
Receiving—FP: Brown 6-192, Johnson 2-88, Quinland 1-20 S: Rollness 9-162, Langston 2-36, Wiker 4-9, Oliver 2-5.
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Sports reporter/columnist Michael Carman can be contacted at 360-417-3525 or at mcarman@peninsuladailynews.com.
