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Raiders end section-record losing streak with 20-20 tie
By Phillip Brents
EL CAJON, Sept. 13, 2002 -- Southwest High’s "new era" football team debuted last Friday night to much anticipation at El Cajon Valley High — leaving the nearly packed stadium with a rollercoaster ride of emotions.
The Raiders, who carried the San Diego Section’s longest consecutive losing streak into the non-league matchup, did not win to hand new head coach Gil Warren a momentous present in this exciting new beginning.
However, Southwest also did not lose — thus halting the South San Diego school’s nearly four-year-long streak of futility.
"Only cry when we win," Warren told quarterback Robert Riggs after the game that ended in a 20-20 tie.
The deadlock was especially disappointing for the Raiders (0-0-1), who had built an early 13-0 lead and still held an eight-point edge on the Braves (1-0-1) entering the final period of regulation play.
However, players spoke about a brighter future they now believed in following their show of force and determination on the field. The Raiders had proven to themselves that they could make their own destiny. There was a genuine aura of electricity on the sideline — not electrocution.
"It feels great to end the losing streak. But that makes us even more want to get a win. We’re going to get a win," said running back Robert Tucker (14 rushes, 84 yards) with a sharp edge of confidence in his voice.
It was Tucker’s 26-yard touchdown run in the first period that ignited the Raiders’ opening offensive surge. Riggs, whom Warren credited with a standout performance, scored on a five-yard run in the next period to hike the Southwest margin to 13 points.
The Braves, who are in the process of turning around their own long loss-plagued program, responded with two unanswered touchdowns to fuel their own engines. One scoring play came at the Raiders’ expense at the end of the first half when it looked like Southwest was about to extend its lead to 16-0. However, a botched field goal attempt led to a 65-yard interception return by ECV’s Perry Gardner (11 rushes, 28 yards) and the Braves — who had been held in a virtual offensive holding pattern throughout the opening 24 minutes — promptly tacked on the first points of the second half on a five-yard scoring run by Gardner to narrow their deficit on the scoreboard to 13-12.
Riggs (11-for-17, 119 yards) later hooked up with receiver DeAndre Hickson on a 61-yard pass play to extend the Southwest lead to 20-12. But with 9:42 to play in the final period, ECV quarterback Kyle O’Connor hit receiver Lewis Bruner for a 16-yard scoring pass and Gardner then ran in the two-point conversion to tie the game.
Solidarity was the focus on both sides of the line of scrimmage.
"We got together. Everyone wants to win. We’re thrilled to beat the streak — it’s over. (But) we’re not satisfied yet," Hickson said. "We’re coming together. We feel together. We’re going to work together."
Warren tried to keep the emotions of his players in rein. "Our kids played hard. We had great defense. We made a couple mistakes. We had momentum until that field goal attempt went for a TD," he said. "Our defense played tough. We can build on this."