Mesa 13
Brophy 3
By Ian C. Beck ’12
THE ROUNDUP
The Mesa Jackrabbits held Brophy’s offense to a lone field goal in their Nov. 20 13-3 upset of the Broncos.
Eleventh-seed Mesa made the big offensive plays they needed in the win that ended the third-seed Bronco’s post season on a cool night at Phoenix College.
“If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can move mountains. And today we moved a mountain,” said Mesa head coach Mr. Kelley Moore after the game.
Brophy and Mesa met earlier in the regular season, a game Brophy won 26-18, but Mesa had Brophy’s number this time around.
The Jackrabbits held the Broncos to just six first downs the entire game with two additional conversions thanks to defensive penalties.
Mesa kept Brophy’s sophomore quarterback Chase Knox ’12 to 11 for 25, 125 yards and no touchdowns and limited the normally potent running back Max Leonesio ’10 to just 49 yards.
Brophy’s junior wide out Josh Dennard ’11 said the team played hard and this is a tough loss.
“We need to work on the little things,” Dennard said looking ahead to next season.
Mesa held the Brophy offense down all night and their own offense came up big when necessary. Kyler Fackrell caught a 46 yard touchdown pass with 1:44 remaining in the first half to give Mesa a 7-3 lead after Alex Garoutte ’10 gave Brophy a 3-0 in the first quarter with a 25-yard field goal.
With quarterback Dallin Parker rolling out of the pocket, Fackrell found a spot behind the secondary and waited for the throw. Parker hit his wide open receiver for a long touchdown.
Parker went nine for 12 for 113 yards with a touchdown and an interception.
Asure McMillan ran in an eight-yard touchdown with 8:20 left in the fourth quarter to give Mesa a 13-3 lead.
Brophy’s attempts at a comeback never really got off the ground afterwards as they went three and out on their next two drives.
Brophy’s last ditch effort at a comeback started with 2:09 remaining in the game when Knox opened Brophy’s final drive with a 51-yard pass to Dennard.
After that, Knox threw three straight incompletions and a Garoutte 55-yard field goal attempt was no good. Garoutte hit one of three field goal attempts in the game, but did come up big on defense early on, picking off Parker and getting a sack.
“We knew we needed to throw, we were just unable to do it. Our defense played well, we just didn’t capitalize,” said coach Mr. Scooter Molander after his team’s tough, season-ending loss.
Brophy finished the season with a 9-3 record. Mesa will move on to face the undefeated Mountain Pointe in the semi-final round of the state playoffs.
