Costly turnovers contribute to Shorewood coming up short in loss to Edmonds-Woodway

The Shorewood defense makes a goal line stand

	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	F
Shorewood	7	10	0	0	17
Edmonds-Woodway	7	0	6	7	20

Edmonds District Stadium, Friday, October 12, 2018, 5pm
Record as of Game Final:
Shorewood (5-2 overall / 4-2 WesCo South)
Edmonds-Woodway (2-5 overall / 2-3 WesCo South)

By Aaron Bert
Photos by Lisa Hirohata

Winning a football game is just not up to the players on the field - it also comes down to preparation from the coaching staff - and in the matchup between the visiting Shorewood Thunderbirds and the Edmonds-Woodway Warriors - the Warrior coaching staff definitely put in a bit of extra preparation in film study and learned you don’t kick the ball deep to the T-bird kick returners.

It was an early kick-off at Edmonds District Stadium and the T-birds were looking to snag another victory on the Warrior’s homecoming night. Senior Joseph Williamson was lined up deep for Shorewood, but Edmonds-Woodway surprised the Shorewood front 7 and botched the kick to the right sideline where it sailed over the heads of the T-bird receiving team and the Warrior kicker recovered the ball. Edmonds-Woodway snagged the initial momentum and started the game on the Shorewood 38.

Edmonds-Woodway is a one dimensional team, with nary a passing attack. They play old school smash mouth football, lining up their extremely capable running back, senior #2 Cappasio Cherry (5’9/185) behind #7 junior fullback Ben Grimes (5’10/180) and a decent sized offensive line and mainly run off tackle or toss sweeps to the outside. Cherry has proved a workhorse all season carrying the load for Edmonds-Woodway, to include putting up 329 yards rushing last week against WesCo South leading Snohomish, and he proved no different this week against the T-birds. Teams have been successful in stymining the Warrior run this season - but as he proved against Shorewood, give him a chance - and he will make you pay.

Edmonds opened up the scoring by going 38 yards on the ground for a quick touchdown at 9:50 mark in the 1st quarter behind Cherry. It appeared as if Shorewood was caught off guard by the brute running of Cherry and it was taking two to three players to bring him down.

Shorewood bounced back on their next possession, starting on their own 20 - senior QB #4 David Snell (6’3/175) connected with his favorite receiver senior WR/DB #2 Jaro Rouse for a 69 touchdown pass, as Rouse - who is absolutely explosive in the open field, easily outpaced the Warrior secondary and raced into the endzone to even the score at 7-7 with 7:25 remaining in the 1st.

#8 Kevin Hirohata recovers an EW fumble

Edmonds-Woodway took possession on their own 34 and then began to do what you can only do when you are a running team - they began to grind the ball out - steadily marching down the field. On this possession they ran 8 run plays in a row for 9 yards / 22 yards / 4 yards / 3 yards / -1 yards / 5 yards / 4 yards / 1 yard / taking the ball down to the Shorewood 15. The T-birds caught a break - as the Edmonds-Woodway quarterback dropped back for a pass, he was pressured by Shorewood LB #31 Brandon Main (6’2/190) who forced a fumble and it was recovered by senior LB #8 Kevin Hirohata (6’/200) at the Shorewood 20.

In response, Shorewood demonstrated their own prowess in the running game, putting together a 15 play, 76 yard drive to take the ball down to the Edmonds-Woodway 4 where senior RB #3 Robert ‘Take it to the Bank’ Banks (5’8/160) came up short on 3rd and goal and Shorewood was forced to kick a 20 yard field goal. On the drive Shorewood converted twice on 3rd and long, to include a 24 yard strike from Snell to Rouse to keep the drive alive. Shorewood took the lead 10-7 with 7:37 remaining in the 2nd.

Shorewood shut down Cherry on the next two possessions, forcing the Warriors to punt and with 1:05 remaining in the 2nd, Shorewood started at their own 16 and took the ball down field 74 yards behind four straight passes from Snell to take a 17-7 lead into halftime. Snell connected with Rouse for 36 yards, Main for 13, Williamson was stopped for no-gain, and then Snell hit Williamson for the 35 yard touchdown.

The second half opened with Shorewood bending but not breaking and forcing the Warriors to punt. Edmonds-Woodway opened with 3 straight runs and it looked like they were finding their footing in the running game, until the EW QB #11 junior Read Carr (5’11/175) found SW senior LB #22 Kaden Graves (6’3/225) in his face and threw him down for a 13 yard sack. EW was forced to punt and Shorewood regained the ball at their own 35 for their opening drive of the half.

#22 Kaden Graves and #52 Tom Bert make tackle with help from #10 Matthew Bangsberg

Facing a 3rd and 17 at their own 34, T-bird QB Snell was flushed out of the pocket and attempted to make something happen, but his pass flew over the head of the Shorewood receiver and was picked off at the EW 20. The Warriors answered by driving the length of the field and Cherry punched it in for the score from the 2 to bring the score to 17-13 as the PAT was no good. EW milked almost 6 minutes off the clock in their 13 play drive. The T-bird defense did not have an answer this drive to the Warrior rushing attack as they ran the ball 12 times, averaging 5.5 yards per carry.

EW forced the T-birds to punt on their next possession and then once again, played a very focused ball-control game, scoring the go-ahead touchdown after starting at their own 20. Burning another 6 minutes off the clock, the Warriors used a combination of deep hand-offs to Cherry and fullback traps to spring for gains of 6, 8, 16, 11, 11, 10, 11 and 2 yards. EW capped the scoring by connecting on a wide receiver screen from the 9 to go up 20-17.

As Shorewood regrouped on the sideline - 4:43 remained in the 4th and it was more than enough time to mount another scoring drive. Shorewood started the drive at their 35 and Snell connected with Rouse for an 8 yard gain. Banks took the inside hand-off and gained the first down with a 4 yard effort. Shorewood was on the move. A solid run was negated on the next play as one of the Shorewood hogs was called for holding, backing up the ball to the SW 40. 

Shorewood shot themselves in the foot the next play with an illegal procedure call and then Snell was sacked dropping Shorewood into a 2nd and 26 at their own 31. With 2:55 remaining, Snell took the snap and sought to create some magic, looking to find one of his speedy receivers downfield, but EW had dropped 7 into coverage and the passing lanes were closed. Snell let the ball fly as he rolled to his right and it was picked off by the EW secondary. The comeback was over and Edmonds-Woodway ran out the clock.

#21 Dashawn Alexander runs back the kickoff

Game Final - Edmonds-Woodway 20 / Shorewood 17

Some takeaways:

• Shorewood held EW running back Cherry to 58 yards in the first half
• In the first half - Snell was 8/10 for 191 yards and 2 touchdowns
• This is the 7th game in a row where the Shorewood defense forced a turnover
• The loss is the 10th straight to Edmonds-Woodway, but was the smallest margin in the series history going back to 1996
• Shorewood sits at the number 2 spot in the WesCo South behind division leading Snohomish
• Shorewood plays Marysville-Getchell next week, but the game will not impact their standing in the South Division win or lose
• Shorewood will play in the week 9 crossover game against a North Division opponent - since Shorewood will be playing the North Division #2 - it will determine the 3rd and 4th place seeding for the week 10 State 3A Playoffs
• If Shorewood wins the week 9 crossover game - they will play the Pierce County League #3 finisher on November 2nd or 3rd
• If Shorewood loses the week 9 crossover game - they will play the KINGCO League #2 finisher on November 2nd or 3rd
• At 4 league wins to date - Shorewood has more league wins in the WesCo than they did between 2013-2017
• Season success is still on the horizon with 3 games remaining, Shorewood can still match their best season ever at 8-2 from 1977 if they win out

Next game -

Friday, October 19, 2018 - 7pm, Shoreline District Stadium - Shorewood Homecoming
Shorewood 5-2 vs. Marysville-Getchell 2-5