Gig Harbor beats Timberline in important playoff positioning game; votes will decide 3A SSC playoff picture
Gig Harbor High School came to South Sound Stadium on Friday night to meet Timberline in a game touted beforehand as having playoff implications.
The Tides held off a Blazers’ rally to win 31-26, evening the two teams’ conference records at 3-3. But the math that matters may be in polls of the league coaches and athletic directors to determine which teams get the SSC’s four first round playoff berths and in what order.
Why?
Peninsula didn’t play its scheduled game with Yelm on Friday and Central Kitsap has cancelled two SSC games because of COVID-19 protocols. The Cougars, who blasted North Thurston, 61-7, on Friday night, will host Yelm next week but won’t play Peninsula.
The league will not count missed game as forfeits, thus the votes after next weekend’s round of games.
“There’s no clear cut answer right now,” said Gig Harbor coach George Fairhart.
“It’s not clear to me, either,” said Timberline coach James Jones
No doubt, though, Gig Harbor gave itself an edge over Timberline in any polls with its win Friday in a hectic game fueled on both sides by opponent’s mistakes and the teams’ own big plays. Each team scored on drives started by defensive takeaways and the decisive play may have been Colin Montgomery’s 95-yard kickoff return that gave Gig Harbor a 31-20 lead in the final minute of the third quarter.
“That was a tough game,” said Fairhart. “Both teams played really hard. We made a lot of mistakes but our kids stuck with it and we came out on top.”
The mistakes started on the first play from scrimmage, when Timberline quarterback Jackson Brown’s pass was tipped, then intercepted by the Tides’ sophomore lineman Leland Lopes.
Thirteen plays later, a stellar catch in traffic at the right pylon by Washington State-bound receiver Hudson Cedarland gave Gig Harbor a 6-0 lead.
Timberline took its only lead of the night, 7-6, with 21 seconds left in the first quarter when Brown dashed 10 yards for a touchdown.
When Timberline went for it on fourth-and-five at the Gig Harbor 45-yard line early in the second quarter, Brown was sacked for a loss of 13. That set up a short Tides’ scoring drive that culminated in a 12-yard pass from Will Landram to Cole Rushforth, who would lead Gig Harbor with eight catches for 75 yards.
A negative situation then led to positive results for Timberline. With Brown temporarily on the sidelines with a cramp, receiver Franco Segura, who had stepped in at quarterback for two games while Brown recovered from a concussion, slid over behind center again.
Returning later, Brown found Mykale Whitehead downfield with a 77-yard touchdown pass and the score was tied at 13-13.
Gig Harbor broke the tie on a two-yard Cedarland run on the ensuing possession and never looked back, scoring later on a 26-yard Jacob Decker field goal and Montgomery’s near end-to-end return.
Timberline scored with just under three minutes to play when Brown scrambled 17 yards for a touchdown that made it 31-26. He ran 12 times for a team-high 67 yards and three touchdowns overall.
The Blazers then did everything they could to get a final chance at the win. Using all three of their second-half time outs, they forced Gig Harbor into a three and out and got the ball back with plenty of time, two minutes and 27 seconds, to perhaps go ahead.
“Our kids don’t give up. They believe in each other,” Jones said. “They gave us a shot.”
But Landram boomed a 42-yard punt that died at the Blazers’ one. Brown completed three of four passes to start the drive, getting Timberline out from the shadow of its own goal posts but four consecutive passes then fell incomplete and the Tides took over for three final kneel-downs.
“We got a little greedy,” Jones said. “We tried to go deep when some short ones were there. We need to take what they give us.”
“They have some great receivers, so our pass defense was huge,” said Fairhart, pointing to junior defensive back Christian Parrish, who intercepted a pass despite having a cast on his hand.
Landram completed 16-of-29 passes for 134 yards.
Brown was busier and passed for more yards, but didn’t have quite the completion percentage, at 15-for-36 and 330 yards.
Timberline ends regular season play next week at South Sound against North Thurston while Gig Harbor will host the other Lacey school, River Ridge.
Then the polls will open.
This story was originally published October 22, 2021 at 11:54 PM.