OAKLEY, Calif. – After Liberty-Brentwood escaped on Saturday night at Freedom High with a 17-13 victory over a Cardinal Newman-Santa Rosa that refused to fold, we suggested to Liberty Coach Ryan Partridge that his team was a modern day version legendary escape artist Harry Houdini.
“Why?” queried Partridge with a sly grin.
The bottom line is Liberty (5-0) has been pretty slippery the past four games. They held on at The Corral in Oakdale, needed overtime and a missed extra point in an Honor Bowl win over Clayton Valley, and a Monte Vista field goal attempt in the waning seconds last week that if good would have sent that game into overtime hit the crossbar.
The finish of the victory over Cardinal Newman didn’t have quite that much drama, but the outcome was still in doubt until the size of Liberty in the trenches prevailed and produced a 12-play drive that consumed the final 7:54 of the contest. The game clinching drive went from the Lions 22-yard line to the Cardinals four and culminated with Liberty quarterback Jay Butterfield taking a knee.
Even so, an undersized Newman defense still managed to keep the Cardinals in the contest by holding their own in the trenches for most of the game, and not really allowing the Lions offense to get a lot of rhythm.
“We haven’t found our identity yet on offense and its coming,” Partridge said. “But the kids are finishing and they know how to win, and that’s the most important thing.”
The 6-6, 210-pound Oregon-committed Butterfield was only 14 of 27 for 142 yards, but his 1-yard keeper with 10:10 left gave Liberty a 17-7 lead and turned out to be the game-winning touchdown. He also showed his leadership on the final drive that included a fourth down conversion.
Although he didn’t get into the end zone Liberty’s Honor Bowl MVP Darrion Bartley was a workhorse once again as expected on both sides of the line of scrimmage as a running back and defensive back. On offense the 5-11, 205-pound Bartley had 28 carries for 184 yards against a Newman defense that hammered him all night and had him down of the field in pain on two occasions.
“We lean on him,” said Partridge of Barkley. “We hand him the ball a million times a game and he’s been great for us playing both sides of the ball every darn down.
Because they were overmatched size-wise on the front line Newman only managed 28 yards rushing, but on defense they only gave up 17 points
“We were outsized and outweighed by forty to fifty pounds,” remarked Cardinals Coach Paul Cronin. “But our kids are one of the toughest bunch of kids we’ve ever had. They played their butts off against one of the toughest teams we’ve ever faced.”
The toughest of them all was probably quarterback Jackson Pavitt. He was pounded by Liberty and sacked three times, once early in the second half on a pancake tackle by 6-1, 265-pound Payton Zdroik. He got up each time and the 6-2, 193-pound senior finished 17 of 28 for 228 yards and two touchdowns.
A player that turned some heads and is quickly developing into one of the top promising young wide receivers in the North Coast Section is the Cardinals’ Tsion Nunnally. The 6-2, 175-pound junior had seven catches for 132 yards and one touchdown. His touchdown came on a slant pattern, and after stumbling a bit Nunnally got his footing and outraced three defenders 58-yards to pay dirt for a score.
Defense was the name of the game and early on a stalled Liberty drive led to a 36-yard line drive field goal by Ryan Tolero that barely cleared the crossbar and gave the Lions a 3-0 lead at the end of the first quarter.
After Newman went three-and-out for a second straight series, Butterfield directed a 12-play 51-yard drive that included a fourth-and-eight 20-yard completion to 6-0, 175-pound senior wide receiver Cody Muth that preceded a 1-yard plunge by 6-0, 210-pound senior Mason Padilla. That gave Liberty a 10-0 lead early in the second quarter.
Newman had a long drive end in a missed field goal attempt, and Liberty had two stalled drive and Newman one before the TD pass to Nunnally cut the Liberty lead to 10-7 at the half.
After a scoreless third quarter the keeper by Butterfield in the early fourth quarter gave Liberty the 17-7 lead but Newman (3-1) would not go away quietly.
After taking the kickoff and getting to their own 29-yard line, Pavitt orchestrated a six-play, 71-yard drive that included a 31-yard pass to Nunnally, an acrobatic 32-yard reception by 6-1, 185-pound senior Giancarlo Woods with a defender on him like a blanket, and then a 4-yard pass receptions by Woods (six receptions, 93 yards, one TD) that closed out the scoring.
From there Butterfield led the drive that ran out the clock.
“This was another game where we had to grind it out with our offensive line but the important thing is we got the win,” Partridge said.
Even in losing Cronin made it clear he was pleased with his team’s performance and told them so in the post game huddle.
“If you pout about the outcome of this game you miss the point,” Cronin told the team. “You guys gave one of the proudest game performances I’ve ever been a part of.”
According to Cronin the Cardinals came out of the game pretty healthy and will now face Balboa-San Francisco on Friday on their new turf field just completed.
Liberty has had some close calls in non-league play but they go into Bay Valley Athletic League action unblemished and looking like a favorite once again. Even so, Partridge took away from this game some things his boys need to improve on, including the fact they had a lot of penalties in this game that stalled them.
“I can take from this game the exact same thing as every game. Early down penalties,” Partridge said. “You cannot play offense with early down penalties. It’s hard to go first and twenty, second and twenty-one. It’s impossible so we have to have less penalties so we’re going to keep preaching it and working our techniques so it doesn’t happen.”
The Lions will get to test those techniques next week on the very same field only this time they’ll be the visitor in a BVAL opener at Freedom.
