Photos by Ray Hamill/HumboldtSports.com – Kavi Bolden and the Huskies will play Bishop O’Dowd for the Division-6 NCS championship in Hayward on Saturday afternoon.
By Ray Hamill — Keeping drives alive and limiting their opponents’ opportunities will be key for the Fortuna Huskies on Saturday afternoon, as they get set to play for a first North Coast Section championship in seven years.
One week after their big win over Big 4 rival St. Bernard’s in the Division-6 semifinals, the Huskies will face of against Bishop O’Dowd at Moreau Catholic High School in Hayward for the championship and a place in next week’s state playoffs.
The Huskies traveled to the Bay Area on Friday, stopping off at Cloverdale High School to practice in the afternoon.
And the Fortuna players and coaches are excited for the opportunity.
“You know what, we’re just happy to be playing another week together,” head coach Mike Benbow said. “We (were) happy to be practicing on Thanksgiving and we’re happy to be playing this late. We’re in a good spot.
“We’re pretty focused, we’re dialed in, and we’re ready to go.”
Fortuna is seeded No. 4 in the bracket, while the Dragons are seeded No. 3, and both schools are coming off road wins over higher seeds last week.
Both also had to overcome some early-season adversity on the way to reaching a section championship game.
The Huskies (8-4) struggled out of the gates this fall and dropped their first three games before finding their groove, overcoming some early-season injuries and winning eight of their last nine games.
The Dragons (8-4) also struggled early in the year, starting 1-3 before stringing together a nice run that included seven wins in their last eight games.
And they’ve succeeded with a balanced and big-play offense, one that is averaging 172.3 yards a game rushing and 98.8 yards a game through the air.
“They’ve got a lot of speed and they’ve got a lot of size up front,” Benbow said. “They kind of cause a bunch of problems.
“They’re super explosive and we’ve got to tackle in space to win.”
Junior Lamar Ellis leads the Dragons’ ground attack and is averaging 154.3 yards rushing a game while also scoring a team-high 17 touchdowns.
Sophomore linebacker Zay Latu has been setting the tone on defense and leads the team with 6.6 tackles a game.
One big key for the Huskies will be sustaining drives and limiting the Dragons’ opportunities on offense.
“We definitely can’t turn the ball over and we have to get first downs,” Benbow said. “If we can string enough first downs together, we’ll be in good shape. We have to keep the ball away from their explosive offense.
“We’ve got to keep it close. If we’re in the game in the fourth quarter we’ve got a chance.”
An injury to one of the Huskies’ star running backs, Mako Limon, won’t help that cause.
Limon was sidelined for much of the second half against St. Bernard’s and Benbow says he will be a game-time decision on Saturday.
“We’ll see how he does,” the longtime Fortuna coach said.
With that in mind, the Huskies may need another big performance by fellow running back Kavi Bolden, who stepped up big time for his team last week in Limon’s absence, scoring two TDs less than a minute apart — one on offense and one on defense — to help Fortuna pull away from the top-seeded Crusaders.
“We need everybody,” Benbow said. “We need all hands on deck for this one.”
The Fortuna fans are also expected to travel in big numbers for the big showdown, as is usually the case for H-DNL teams in the playoffs.
“I’ll say this, we always have great community support, and we expect the same thing tomorrow,” Benbow said.
One way or the other, it should be a competitive game at a stage of the season where every matchup is challenging.
Saturday’s game is set for 2 p.m. and will be broadcast live on local radio on 95.1 FM with Tag Wotherspoon calling the action.
The game will also be streamed live on The NFHS Network.
