Apaches dominate homecoming game

GONZALES — The Apaches have had a not-so-happy homecoming the past two years, getting shut down by Navarro and Bellville. This year, Gonzales was set to take on Uvalde, a 5A team that was picked to win district. However, the defense and quick running by running back Josh Calvin was able to put the home team over the top as they took down the Coyotes 40-22.

Apaches’ head coach Kodi Crane and his staff scouted the Coyotes and knew how quick they can go. But the defense didn’t get to see how quickly, no matter how much they practiced, with Uvalde starting out the game on a seven-play, 76-yard touchdown drive that took off just 1:56 of game clock.

“It wasn’t drive it down, it was getting a track meet and going Mach 7,” Crane said of how fast Uvalde scored. “The speed of the game hit us right in the face. We tried to simulate this in practice. We knew this was coming. That pace was unreal. That’s Oregon, that’s Baylor…it took our kids to go a little while and go ‘whoa, this is what they were talking about.’”

The Apaches then went three-and-out and it seemed they were in for a long game. But on the Coyotes’ second play of their second drive, Matthew Velasquez-Banda, the sophomore defensive back, snagged an interception to set up a quick touchdown drive for the Apaches. The next play, it was Colby Cox’s turn who grabbed an interception to give the Apaches yet another short field, setting up another touchdown drive to give Gonzales the 13-8 lead.

“[Our defense] adjusted to that speed,” Crane said, “just adjusted to the space. We [adjusted] how we’re getting signals in and how we’re communicating everything between our secondary. Once we got that down, we were good.”

Meanwhile, the Apaches offense were able to get things rolling after that abysmal first drive. Josh Calvin led the team in rushing, carrying the ball 19 times for 178 yards and three scores.

“Our offensive line stepped up to the challenge,” Crane said. “They’re still plenty of growing pains that we’re going to have to go through. But our offensive coaches did a great job with [adjustments].”

Crane also gave props to Calvin whose biggest gain of the night was a 54-yard touchdown run on the second play of the third quarter, calling the shifty back “a quick little dude.”

“Our offensive line gave him a seam,” he explained, “and once he gets to the second or third level, then he can do some special things with the football.”

Up 40-14, the Apaches defense gave up a score early in the fourth quarter, but then shut down Uvalde the rest of the night.

Crane explained that regardless of the scoreboard, he wants his team focused to close out games.

“We don’t want to pay attention [to the scoreboard],” he said. “Who cares what that says? We’re going to be faced with 150 four-to-six-second plays. We’ve got to be focused on every play. I don’t care how good or how bad the last play was. Stay focused on the play itself and who cares what that scoreboard says. We’ll figure that out at the end and I think our kids did a good job with that.”

One spot the Apaches need to clean up is their quarterback protection. Starting QB Garrett Rickman took multiple shots in the pocket, taking seven sacks Friday night. Crane believes it’s going to have to take a total team effort to make sure his QB doesn’t take those unnecessary hits.

“It is an offensive line issue, it is a running back issue in protection and it is a receiver issue running good, hard, fast drives and it is a quarterback issue getting it out on time,” he explained. “There’s not just one person or one possession, it is a group effort to get that fix.”

The Apaches are on an open week this week before taking on La Grange to start District 10-4A2 play. But before they do, Crane knows that his team still has work to do to compete.

“We still have a ton of things to fix to win a district championship.”