Friday night’s contest between the De La Salle Spartans and the San Ramon Valley Wolves turned into a highlight reel for the Spartans’ Bart Houston and Austin Hooper. The Spartans most definitely showed why they are among the top ranked teams in the state.
De La Salle began their offensive domination on the ground, driving 10 plays for 55 yards, all rushing, capped by a four yard carry by David Riopelle for the score. San Ramon’s second possession was stopped on a third down sack by De La’s Justin Walker. After a Wolves punt, Bart Houston connected with Receiver, Anthony Williams, on a second down for a 52 yard touchdown extending the Spartan lead to 14-0. SRV’s next offensive series looked promising as they went on a 14 play drive that would end in three points with a 38 yard boot by Kicker, Matt Anderson, in which he made with ease. The Spartan offense returned to the field and put a fast end to any momentum the Wolves had gained with a 68 yard scoring drive where Houston hooked up with Williams again this time from 32 yards out which put the De La Salle lead at 21-3. The Spartan defense stopped the Wolves again on a third down sack by Chris Olinger and Justin Walker. De La’s Tiapepe Vitale lead the Spartan charge on the ground and finished another scoring drive with 13 of his 103 yards in the game for a touchdown. San Ramon Quarterback, Zach Kline, was under more pressure from the De La Salle defense on the following possession this time being sacked by Austin Hooper, who made one of his five sacks in the game, which helped to force another Wolves punt. Bart Houston and the Spartan offense regained possession with 31 seconds in the half which was just enough time for Houston to hit Receiver, Andrew Buckley, for a 37 yard touchdown strike giving De La a 34-3 halftime lead.
The second half started with a stop by the Wolves defense lead by Linebacker, Ryan Dunn, who was their bright light on defense that night. The SRV offense began a 16 play drive that was ended by two more Hooper sacks and a couple of tackles for loss by Luc Hamilton, who also added two sacks in the first half. The Spartans final score of the night, came at the beginning of the fourth quarter when Houston threw his fourth touchdown pass of the contest, this time to Austin Hooper who took the pass and ran it in from 44 yards out. Zach Kline connected with Receiver Matt Turner on a couple of passes, but the Spartan defense came up with yet another stop to end the Wolves threat.
De La Salle did a spectacular job defensively of not letting Zach Kline feel comfortable throughout the entire game. Instead, Kline was constantly pressured all night by an impressive Spartan defense.