BREMERTON — When your starting tailback totals 143 yards rushing and three touchdowns on his first three carries of the game, chances are your team is going to win.
Neah Bay sophomore Cole Svec did just that, stepping up offensively with three first-quarter scores as the Red Devils buried Twin Valley 74-12 in the Class 1B state quarterfinals Saturday at Silverdale Stadium.
“Better, so much better,” Neah Bay head coach Tony McCaulley said when asked to compare last week’s 78-30 victory over Pateros with this blowout of Twin Valley.
“We played with much more intensity. [We] didn’t have a real great week of practice, in fact I canceled Friday it was so bad, but I think they woke up today.”
The Red Devils defense, a point of concern against Pateros, was dominant, holding Twin Valley to just 127 yards of total offense, 148 through the air and minus-21 yards rushing on 26 carries.
With the win, Neah Bay (11-0) will face Northwest Football League rival Lummi (10-3) in the state semifinals at the Tacoma Dome at 4 p.m. this Saturday.
The Red Devils and Blackhawks have faced off twice already this season, with Neah Bay topping Lummi 38-26 in week two and 50-38 in league play in week seven.
Unlike last week, Neah Bay’s defense showed up from the get-go Saturday against Twin Valley, which is comprised of players from Wishkah Valley and Lake Quinault.
Defensive end John Reamer sacked Wolfpack quarterback Kobe Kalama on third down and then recovered a muffed punt snap at the Twin Valley 15-yard line.
A play later, Svec took a toss sweep to the right sideline for his first touchdown and an 8-0 lead before two minutes were off the game clock.
The Red Devils forced another three-and-out defensively, and then Svec took the ball 86 yards to the end zone for a 14-0 lead less than three minutes later.
“Twin Valley really stacked the box and sold out to stop our inside run game,” McCaulley said.
“We saw that and decided to go outside on them, and they just didn’t have the speed to keep up.”
Svec added his third TD and put Neah Bay up 22-0 after taking a toss to the right sideline, dancing around a Twin Valley defender at the 15-yard line and then accelerating forward to the end zone.
“I just run as hard as I can and try to maneuver around my blocks and that’s what really springs those runs,” Svec said.
“I do like running on our sidelines. Seeing and hearing the crowd go wild makes me want to push a little harder.”
Svec finished the game with six carries for 173 yards.
With the run game established, Neah Bay took to the air for its next two scores.
Rwehabura Munyagi Jr. found Reamer running from left to right across the deep middle of the field and Reamer did the rest, shaking off Twin Valley’s Robert Rodriguez at the 15 and out-muscling safety Julio Silva at the goal line to get the ball across for the score.
On the next Red Devil possession, Svec took another toss 29 yards into Wolfpack territory before Munyagi found Cameron Buzzell up the middle for a 32-yard scoring strike.
Twin Valley, meanwhile, couldn’t get anything going offensively in the first half.
Reamer and Elisha Winck were active in the Wolfpack backfield, totaling three first-half sacks from their edge positions, and Neah Bay’s pass defense also was stout with far fewer breakdowns in coverage than last week.
“Yeah, from our last game, we didn’t do so well against the pass, so we really tried working on pass coverages and all the hard work paid off,” Svec, who knocked down three passes on the night, said.
Neah Bay added its final score of the first half and kick-started the 40-point-margin running clock on a 53-yard counter by Buzzell with 7:16 before halftime.
Senior Collin Haupt scored on a 4-yard rush to open the fast-moving second half and backup quarterback Benjamin Greene found Winck for a 39-yard score to put the Red Devils up 60-0.
Svec added an 82-yard kickoff return for another touchdown after the Wolfpack got on the board on a 26-yard pass play from Jace Anderson to Kalama against the Neah Bay reserves.
“We were solid tonight,” Reamer said. “The defense really stepped its game up, almost got the shutout there, but [you] have to give the youngsters some playing time.”
And now another late-season meet-up with Lummi in the Tacoma Dome, the third straight semifinal matchup and sixth straight season in which their playoff paths have merged.
“So far so good,” Svec said of their postseason push.
“We just have to keep working hard and we’ll get there [the state championship game].”
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Sports reporter Michael Carman can be contacted at 360-452-2345, ext. 5250 or at mcarman@peninsualdailynews.com.
