State football quarterfinals roundup: Top-seed Tumwater runs over Sehome, 70-7
Results, recaps and more from Week 12 high school football contests around the South Sound will be posted on this page Friday and Saturday.
SATURDAY’S RESULTS (NOV. 23)
WIAA State — 2A Quarterfinals
No. 1 Tumwater 70, No. 9 Sehome 7
Wrecking both sides of the football is the norm for Tumwater RB/LB Cash Short, but Saturday’s performance in the 2A state quarterfinals takes the cake.
He snagged an early interception and rumbled 20 yards for a pick-six, a statement made on the game’s first scoring play. Within minutes, Short had rumbled for another score when his designed run to the outside went 52 yards to the house.
He sacked two, both for loss. And when visiting Sehome took over deep into their own territory, Tumwater unleashed a rare five-man rush as Short burst around the line and sacked Mariners QB Nolan Wright in the endzone for a safety.
All in the first quarter.
Two touchdowns (one on each side), two sacks, an interception, and a forced safety. In 12 minutes.
Was it indeed his best performance yet? Short’s too humble.
“I couldn’t really do all of that stuff without the other guys,” he said. “You can’t put that all on me, right? That pick-six, that was the D-Linemen getting pressure, DBs were covering that forced a bad throw. … Teammates made that possible.”
Wave the white flag in Tumwater, again: Short scored twice in the opening quarter, WR Sunny Nguyen ran for a pair of touchdowns, and the No. 1 T-Birds bolstered their case as 2A’s best team in an unexpected-turned-unbelievable rout in Saturday’s state quarterfinals: Tumwater 70, Sehome 7.
They’re one win away from returning to Husky Stadium for the 2A state championship – and two wins from the title – and no team has figured out these T-Birds yet. No team has come close.
“(We) rolled, and momentum kicked in,” Tumwater head coach Willie Garrow said. “Sometimes, those things happen. (Sehome’s) a good team. A couple of breaks here and there and we get up by a big lead, they start hanging their heads a bit, and our kids just jumped on it.
“I didn’t expect (70 points). Let’s just put it that way.”
Short won’t take credit, but Tumwater’s linebacker remembers the message drilled into his head at practice – spy on dangerous dual-threat Sehome QB Nolan Wright, known for extending plays with his legs. And so Short waited, patiently, before locking eyes with the signal caller.
Sensing a throw over the middle, Short jumped the route and ran 20 yards in a flash. His final stat line reads like a run-on sentence — Three carries for 61 yards and a touchdown rush, a 20-yard interception return touchdown, one safety, 10 tackles, three tackles for loss, and three sacks.
“Me and Beckett (Wall) were right there,” Short smiled, describing the pick-six. “It would’ve been either one of us.”
Tumwater ran the football at will, stacking 386 total yards despite rotating junior varsity and freshman squads into the game by halftime. Saturday’s running clock, triggered by a 40-point lead, rolled some 14 minutes into play.
Tumwater QB Jaxon Budd completed all three of his pass attempts for 49 yards and a two-yard touchdown pass to Mathias Rodriguez in the second quarter. Eight T-Birds scored a touchdown from scrimmage.
“We have a program of 100 strong, and I think it’s because kids have a great experience when they’re here,” Garrow said. “We played our junior varsity kids the entire second half. We even got our freshman team in there at the end, so they get to have those memories with their parents sitting in the stands at a state quarterfinal game. And I think that’s a reason why Tumwater continues to have that success.”
Sehome WR Andre Watson was the engine for the Mariners offense and secured a 10-yard touchdown catch in the third quarter, erasing the shutout albeit controversially; his feet appeared out of bounds upon photo and video review.
Still, a stat that doesn’t seem real: Tumwater (12-0) has now outscored their last seven opponents by a combined score of 402-15.
The next team tasked with stopping a freight train? An old friend.
The T-Birds host No. 4 Archbishop Murphy to town for next weekend’s 2A semifinals, a familiar foe in the state bracket. The winner books a trip to Husky Stadium for the state championship next month, and both programs utilize the classic Wing-T offense.
“Theirs is a little bit more Bellevue-esque, more physical and downhill,” Garrow said. “We’re a bit more (deceptive). That part of it’s going to be fun.”
FRIDAY’S RESULTS (NOV. 22)
WIAA State — 2A Quarterfinals
No. 6 W.F. WEST 27, No. 3 FRANKLIN PIERCE 8
Franklin Pierce came into its Class 2A state tournament quarterfinal game against visiting W.F. West on Friday night undefeated, having run the ball down opponents’ throats all season long.
The No. 3 Cardinals ran into a brick wall on Friday night against a prepared and motivated W.F. West defensive front.
And No. 6 W.F. West flipped the script: some of the best runs of the night came from 6-foot-2, 210 pound Bearcats’ quarterback Gage Brumfield, an Eastern Washington commit.
Franklin Pierce’s offense had been averaging nearly 400 yards per contest on the ground this season. W.F. West silenced Franklin Pierce’s Power T offense in Parkland on Friday, leading 21-0 at half en route to a 27-8 win.
“We knew that we had a really good shot at it, we were all confident coming into the game,” Brumfield said. “We had a gameplan, we knew what we needed to do and we came through with it.”
That gameplan called for a heavy dose of the talented Brumfield, who threw for one touchdown and ran for two more in the win.
“Every time (I run the ball), I plan on scoring,” he said. “Every single time. It’s my favorite part of the game.”
Outside of a loss to No. 1 Tumwater, W.F. West has been flawless this season.
“Especially now, we have a lot of belief in ourselves,” Brumfield said. “We have a lot of confidence. That game, we weren’t exactly ready for that game but we’ll be ready the next time we see (Tumwater).”
One of the game’s only bright spots for the hosts came late, when running back Bryson Allen ripped off a 69-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter, avoiding the shutout. Otherwise, there wasn’t much doing in the run game.
“They were really physical at the point of attack, so hats off to them,” Franklin Pierce coach Trevor Hanson said. “Credit to them playing a really strong brand of defense.”
With a win, Franklin Pierce would’ve advanced to the state tournament semifinals for the first time since 2007. It wasn’t meant to be.
“The sting of defeat is gonna sting for a while, but when we zoom back and look at the full season and full picture, this is the best season our school has had in 17 years,” Hanson said. “League championship, rival championship, making a push to the quarterfinals. We’re incredibly proud of our student-athletes.”
W.F. West will play the winner of the No. 2 Anacortes vs. No. 7 West Valley (Spokane) in next week’s semifinal round.
SOUTH SOUND SCOREBOARD
4A Quarterfinals
No. 5 Gonzaga Prep 34, No. 4 Kennedy Catholic 28, Final
3A Quarterfinals
No. 2 O’Dea 42, No. 10 Mount Tahoma 14, Final
2A Quarterfinals
No. 6 W.F. West 27, No. 3 Franklin Pierce 8, Final
This story was originally published November 22, 2024 at 10:34 PM.
