Football defeated St. Ignatius 24-14 on Friday night at Bob Wilson Stadium.

St. Ignatius jumped out to an early lead, but the Cougars rallied back to tie the score by the end of the first half.

Junior running back Nicky Moore explained how his team was able to battle back: “We always seem to go down by a little bit and we come back in the second half so we made those adjustments, started focusing on moving players around to get to a different spot. [Coach’s] message was to just stay in the game and not get too down on ourselves in half time and keep our heads in it, and keep fighting.”

Head Coach Kevin Macy was unfazed by his squad’s early struggles.”This reminded us a lot of last year where we’d come out slow and the other team gets a chance and scores early. The type of offense that they run is so hard for us to simulate in practice. That’s a tricky type of an offense that we had to try to figure out on the fly.  The kids hung in, they bought us some time, we made our adjustments, said Macy.

With 13 seconds left in the 3rd quarter, Moore ran 12 yards into the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown. He finished with 44 total yards.

Moore was sure to give the credit to his offensive line for the winning drive: “It feels great but, I mean, all the hard work about that drive to get us down there, I think those are the guys that deserve the recognition. They did all the work- I just happened to carry the ball.”

“I think that we have a lot of heart. We’re inexperienced, but we make up for it with how hard we play. There are no friend groups on this team, we’re all one big family and that chemistry is huge,.” added senior linebacker Sterling Strother.

The Cougars held their opponents scoreless in the 2nd half. “They were running their sweeps pretty well and we had to adjust to that. Our coaches did a heck of a job. I think we have the best coaches in California. Our linebackers adjusted really well, our defensive ends adjusted really well” Strother said.

St. Ignatius’s quarterback Peter Katz threw 2 costly interceptions in the second half, one to senior Miles Harrison and the other to senior Madison Young.

Macy noted how important the game was for the student body, the coaches and his players. “We don’t have the same personalities or star power as last year, but the kids still played hard. It was a very big game. I think the kids sensed it. it brought out a big crowd. everyone’s happy with this,” he said.

Opening the season at 2-0, the Cougars have not lost a regular season game for nearly 3 years. Their last loss came on September 14, 2012 against El Cerrito.