It was supposed to be a revenge game for Lahainaluna, who were shutout
and manhandled by Baldwin in their first meeting 21-0. The Lunas overall played
pretty well defensively, but poor play on special teams gave Baldwin great
field position early on for early scores. Each time, Baldwin punted it into a
stiff wind from the outer band of Hurricane Ana. Each time, a Lahainaluna
player near the punt’s landing zone failed to clear the way, allowing the ball
to touch them. Baldwin would recover in great field position. This happened on
successive punts in the first half.
The Lunas lost the battle in the trenches to the bigger Bears team.
Defenders got quick and early penetration into our backfield, often times
disrupting the play before it could get going. On the other end, Baldwin
runners showed patience waiting for holes to be inevitably opened up through
which they accelerated through for big gains. The familiar gang-tackling from
Lahainaluna was often absent as defenders found themselves having to go one-on-one
in trying to tackle the Baldwin runners. Still, the Lunas kept themselves in
the game. The big play came on a pass play from Bailey Honda to Siale Hafoka,
who caught the ball and was taken to the ground about 3 yards short of the goal
line. The Lunas eventually scored on a Nathaniel Somera plunge up the middle to
make the score 13-6 (the extra point attempt was blocked by about 5 Bears).
Lunas still had a shot, but the Lunas fielded a punt within their own 5
yard line (rather than letting it bounce into the endzone for a touchback) and
the runner was dropped at about the 2. Two plays later, a runner was tackled in
the backfield – in the end zone- and the Bears had a safety to make it 15-6.
No comments:
Post a Comment