HALF MOON BAY – In carrying the football through the “jumbo set” scrum, “all you see is black for a minute,” said Half Moon Bay running back P.J. Modena. “And sooner or later, you break free, and you’re just outrunning everybody.”
Modena was describing a tight double-wing formation that Half Moon Bay unleashed upon Carlmont, changing the game in the Cougars’ 49-35 nonleague victory Friday night.
Modena ran for 188 yards – all but 22 out of the set – on 22 carries and scored three touchdowns. Meanwhile, the Scots’ tried to keep up with the tandem of running back John Hanna (151 yards on 23 carries) and quarterback Jack Wiessinger (17 of 24 for 240 yards and two touchdowns).
Half Moon Bay (3-0), coming out of the Peninsula Athletic League’s Bay Division and ranked No. 18 by the Bay Area News Group, got the victory. But the PAL Ocean’s Carlmont (2-1), despite coming from the middle level of the three-tiered league, made the Cougars work for it.
Half Moon Bay opened the game in a spread offense, often with four receivers, and with quarterback Liam Harrington running a triple-threat attack. And it was working. Harrington scored from three yards on the opening drive, with Carlmont biting on a fake handoff, and the Cougars never trailed.
But Carlmont kept battling, and when Trevor Johnson scored on a reverse to cut the deficit to 15-14 with 4:17 left in the second quarter, coach Keith Holden felt Half Moon Bay needed something different.
The answer was a change so dramatic, it was like watching Dorothy step into a technicolor world of Oz after an existence in Kansas black and white. Owen Miller lined up on the left wing, Modena on the right and Peter Valdez in the middle, a step behind Harrington under center.
From that point on, Half Moon Bay only used the jumbo set. And why not? Carlmont couldn’t stop it. On that drive, Modena carried seven times in eight plays, gaining 77 yards and crashing through from nine to score. The same formula worked on the next drive, with Modena scoring from 23.
Meanwhile, Half Moon Bay faced a crisis when defensive coordinator Barrett Krieger was laid up with a bad back and left the game in agony at halftime. In his stead, the Cougars’ defense was frequently caught off-guard.
“I ended up calling the defense,” Holden said. “He’s better than me. I made us worse. He’s pretty dialed in and I don’t know the defense like he does.”
Though Half Moon Bay grabbed a 35-14 third-quarter lead on a 44-yard fumble return by Ayden Courtney, courtesy of a punchout by Kai Zanette, Carlmont twice closed within a touchdown in the fourth quarter. Each time, the Scots directed an onside kick at Aidan Vazquez, but the Cougar lineman secured the ball each time, and Half Moon Bay ate up all but 38 seconds of the final 6:25 with a TD drive finished off by Valdez.
As for Carlmont, coach Eric Rado praised the play and work ethic of Hanna and Wiessinger, a three-year starter at QB.
“Both kids have committed themselves in the weight room,” Rado said. “They’re unselfish players and quiet workers, and they’ve just been steadily getting better each year. They’ve proved themselves, they’re guys you can rely on, and all their teammates respect them. I’m very proud of them.”
