5 takeaways from the ninth week of high school football in Thurston County and beyond

Six teams are headed to the district playoffs. How did they get there?

Here are five takeaways from the ninth week of high school football in Thurston County and beyond.

1. The 3A SSC plays rock, paper, scissors

Rock, paper, scissors.

From one angle, not even that schoolyard tiebreaker can separate teams at the top of the rapidly-toughening Class 3A South Sound Conference.

As so often happens, Timberline (7-2) and Peninsula (7-2) finished in first place with 6-1 league records, though the Seahawks claimed the league title and top seed with a head-to-head overtime win over the Blazers earlier this season.

No. 9 Yelm (6-3) is the third seed, finishing with a 5-2 league record after losing at home to Timberline on Friday night.

By comparative scores, the three teams can’t be separated.

If the Tornados hadn’t dropped their league-opening game to Central Kitsap, there would have been a three-way tie for first with head-to-head results useless in breaking the deadlock:

Peninsula defeated Timberline in overtime, 28-27. Friday night, Timberline dropped Yelm, 33-13. But two weeks ago, Yelm doubled up Peninsula, 42-21.

Fourth-place Central Kitsap (6-3) and sixth-place Capital (5-4) have overall winning records, though only Central Kitsap will advance.

In short, the 3A SSC doesn’t appear it will be a one- or two-horse race again anytime soon.

Timberline will host Oak Harbor (7-2) in the district playoffs while Yelm will go on the road to meet Bishop Blanchet (5-3) on Saturday.

Friday night against the Tornados, Timberline fell behind 7-0 on a 20-yard touchdown pass from Kyle Robinson to Kodee Gifford that was tipped by Blazers’ defender Izaiah Jerenz, but then swarmed past the Tornados for 26 unanswered points and were never in danger.

“Jason (Ronquillo, Yelm’s coach) has done a really great job with that program,” Timberline coach Nick Mullen said. “We knew they were going to bring it. That’s what we expect when teams like ours meet.”

Senior quarterback Hunter Campau had another stellar night, completing 9 of 14 passes for 148 yards and rushing 18 times for 105 yards.

Campau rushed for two touchdowns and threw scoring passes to J.J. Graham and Jerenz. Jaden Gorman, who rushed 17 times for 81 yards, ran for the other Blazers score.

“I’m just really proud of these guys,” Campau said. “We didn’t come out with the best start, I struggled a bit, we came together and got the job done.”

For Yelm, Robinson completed 18 of 33 passes for 152 yards. Carson Ammendt, who ran for a fourth quarter touchdown to complete Yelm’s scoring, totaled 147 yards on 22 carries. Austen Osso led Tornados receivers catching six balls for 65 yards.

Meanwhile, in Purdy, Peninsula wrapped up the 3A SSC crown and the top seed with a 45-7 rout of Capital, which played without star senior Chris Penner. The Seahawks will meet Seattle Prep in the first round of the playoffs.

2. Black Hills, Tumwater at home, Hawks hit the road

No. 5 Black Hills (9-0) emphatically finished its undefeated season with a 68-12 road victory at Rochester while No. 7 Tumwater (8-1) bounced back from its loss to the Wolves in last week’s Pioneer Bowl with a 56-0 shutout of Centralia at Tumwater District Stadium.

The Wolves will host Columbia River (5-3) on Friday night, while the T-Birds will host Woodland (8-1) on Saturday.

In Black Hills’ win over the Warriors, Taylor Simmons rushed for 101 yards on six carries, scoring one touchdown.

Simmons also scored on one of two first-quarter touchdown passes from sophomore quarterback Jaden Cote, from 48 yards out. Cote’s other touchdown went to Ethan Loveless from 11 yards away.

Jordan Claridge, Payton Hoyt and Ryan Moloney also rushed for touchdowns while Simmons completed an all-around strong night with a 35-yard punt return for a touchdown.

Tumwater got 117 yards rushing and two touchdowns on just six carries from Dylan Loftis and Zane Murphy scored on both a run and two pass receptions from Wyatt Palmer to rout the Tigers. Cody Whalen threw a touchdown pass to Scott Duboiski as well.

Meanwhile, River Ridge (6-3) will travel to North Kitsap (8-1) to meet the Vikings in the first round, after claiming the fifth seed out of the 2A SPSL with a 34-0 Thursday night win over visiting Washington.

Kieran Hunkin rushed for a game-high 73 yards on 16 carries for a pair of touchdowns. Darion Brown also had a rushing touchdown for the Hawks while each quarterback used, Jevon Brown and Tomasi Manu, fired a touchdown pass, both to sophomore Dontae Owens

3. Elma drops finale but heads into 1A playoffs

Elma finished third in the 1A Evergreen Conference, losing only to the two teams ahead of the Eagles in the standings, Hoquiam and Montesano. The loss to the Bulldogs came Friday night, 25-19, in the final minute of a bitterly contested battle.

Nonetheless, the Eagles are back in the playoffs for the first time since 2013 and will coincidentally meet the same opponent, La Center (4-5), which defeated them 54-28 five years ago. The game is at La Center on Friday night.

Elma fell to the Bulldogs for the 13th straight time in the East County War on Friday when Shaydon Farmer threw a 12-yard touchdown pass to Sam Winter with just 25 seconds to play.

Eagles coach Ron Clark remains confident.

“We’re fine. We can play with anybody,” he told The Daily World. “We made enormous strides this year and we’ll keep making them to keep our season alive.”

Brady Shriver rushed for 93 yards and a touchdown for Elma, while quarterback Cody Vollan completed 7 of 17 passes for 100 yards and a touchdown.

4. For the love of the game

As always, high school teams in Washington that don’t make the playoffs have the option of playing a Week 10 nonleague game. Those scheduled thus far include:

▪ Kent-Meridian (4-5) at Olympia (2-7) at 7 p.m. Saturday.

▪ Shelton (1-8) at Mount Tahoma (0-9) at 7 p.m. Friday.

▪ Mossyrock (2-7) at Tenino (0-9) at 7 p.m. Friday.

5. Shelton gets off the schneid

Baby steps taken since the start of practice in August finally paid off with a big stride for Shelton, as the rebuilding Highclimbers won their first 3A SSC game in more than two years, beating North Thurston on the road, 24-17.

The last time Shelton won a league game — 15 losses ago — came over the Rams at home in October of 2016, 31-21.

Friday, Shelton fell behind 7-0, but tied the Rams before the first quarter was over on a 70-yard pass by Luke McPhee to Charlie Hurt.

After North Thurston again took the lead, Shelton kicked a third quarter field goal, then went ahead to stay on a 5-yard touchdown pass from McPhee to Anthony Boren and a 40-yard touchdown run by Boren.

McPhee completed 5 of 11 passes for 144 yards. Boren led in both rushing (51 yards on six carries) and receiving (three catches for 40 yards).

North Thurston running back Gary Garcia had a productive night with 20 carries for 107 yards and two touchdowns.

This story was originally published October 27, 2018 at 6:06 PM.