‘Cats fall to state champs, set sites on Red Wolves

Published 9:20 pm Thursday, October 2, 2008

SNOQUALMIE – Defending 3A state football champion Skyline kept its hopes of a title defense alive Friday night with a tough 28-14 victory over the Mount Si Wildcats.

Skyline’s offensive stars were quarterback Brian Foreman and running back Simi Reynolds, and their contributions to the Spartan attack put the Wildcats away. Skyline improved to 7-1 on the season, and the Wildcats fell to 4-4 on their season with the loss.

The first quarter was a showcase for Reynolds. After the Spartan defense stopped Mount Si on three-and-out, forcing the Wildcats to punt, Reynolds went to work on offense.

Upon losing a couple of yards on his first carry, Reynolds was handed the ball several more times. With each carry he churned up the yards until he reached the Mount Si 1-yard line, when Foreman sneaked into the end zone for the touchdown. The extra point was good, and with less than five minutes left in the first half, Skyline was up 7-0.

The second Mount Si drive ended when the Spartans’ Shaun Siduris returned an interception into the end zone for a touchdown, which gave the Spartans a 13-0 lead. It was his first of two interceptions in the game. The quarter ended on a defensive note, as both sides on their next possessions each went three-and-out and were forced to punt.

The second quarter for Skyline began just like the first, with a combination of Foreman and Reynolds paving the way offensively for the Spartans. Reynolds ended this drive with a touchdown with 9:08 left in the half, and after a two-point conversion, Skyline was up 21-0.

Mount Si quarterback Byron Dill then got the Wildcats going on offense. He scored a touchdown on a run from 14 yards out with 4:47 left, and that put the Wildcats on the board, but still trailing 21-7.

Skyline went back to work on offense, again with the combination of Foreman and Reynolds. However, the Wildcats’ Taylor McClellan intercepted a Foreman pass, which started a Mount Si drive that featured two Brett Bergstrom pass receptions and a huge Spartan pass-interference penalty to set up another Dill touchdown, this time on his own quarterback sneak from five yards out. The extra point was good and the Wildcats trailed by seven, 21-14.

The only scoring drive of the second half came in the third quarter, and was set into motion by an interception by Skyline’s Joey Vieceli, his first of two as well.

Reynolds and Foreman put the offense in motion, and the drive finished with a 1-yard touchdown run by Reynolds. The extra point was good, and that put the Spartans up 28-14.

The Spartan duo, along with a little supporting help from Brody O’Connor, kept Skyline’s offense going the rest of the way, but the Wildcats’ defense put the brakes on any more Skyline scoring. Mount Si’s Bruce Opsal intercepted a Foreman pass late in the fourth quarter in his own end zone, which brought this point home.

The Wildcats’ Jeremy Bess suffered an injury in the fourth quarter. He hobbled off the field, was attended to by Wildcat medical personnel and did not return.

“Our defense played well, and in the second quarter we got a spurt and if we could have carried that momentum from the second quarter into the third, things would have been different,” said coach Charlie Kinnune. “We have some injuries and are pretty dinged up but the bottom line is Skyline is a tough team. They are coached well and doing all the right things.

“Next week we have everything to play for, its the Valley Cup,” said Kinnune. “We are playing for a winning season, the seniors are playing for a legacy,” he added.

“I am proud of how our team played, we played hard and had compliments from their coaching staff. We have to build on the game and move on,” he continued.

Mount Si’s next game is the Valley Cup, which takes place Friday, Nov. 2, at home. Game time is 7:30 p.m.

The trophy, sponsored by the Snoqualmie Valley Record since 1974, will be presented to the winning team immediately following the game.