There was a glimpse of hope Friday night at the Bob Benson stadium. Central Catholic was on the verge of losing their 4 game winning streak to St. Joseph Academy. The first 3 quarters were well played, but the 4^th quarter is where all the excitement was.

Down 31-20 with roughly 2 and a half minutes to play, St. Joe kicked off thinking they were going to win this one. Central received and ran the ball a couple of yards. A few plays later, Number 4, Austin Vargas, ran in for a touchdown. Desperate for the 2 point conversion, Jimmy runs for it but fails to get it. Our last hope was to somehow recover an onside kick and make a touchdown. There was about 1 minute on the board and CC was prepared to kick off and hopefully recover. Number 17, Jacob Petri, kicked off and the ball tumbled along the ground. As it was tumbling, the ball jumped up and landed in the arms of Centrals number 13, Jeffery Flores. He ran a few yards and was down. The ball was ours.

The crowd went wild! The roars of Section R capitalized on the excitement that had just occurred. The hard part was done. There was a chance. Can we pull it off? A few plays later with a minute left, quarterback Jimmy Morton, threw an off-balanced spiral from his own 40 to the end zone across the field. At the receiving end lingered Thomas Palomera who caught the ball and stumbled into the blue. Touchdown! The team stormed out onto the field in celebration. To top that off, a 2 point conversion was successfully attempted. The score was now 34-31, Central Catholic.

“The game isn’t over till the clock hits 0,” said senior player Pedro Contreras. It was true with all the excitement that was happening, the team still had to focus on the game. With 18 seconds left on the clock, who knows what can happen. CC kicked off and SJA received. With a few seconds left on the clock, SJA tried for a Hail Mary pass but failed. The game clock hit 0 and the team once again rushed out onto the field. Central Catholic shut out its true competition.

“Ecstatic. I’m so happy how we could have pulled that out,” said quarterback Jimmy Morton when asked about his emotions. It was an emotional win for the football players. Coming back from a 14 point deficit was difficult but they had a chance and took it. It truly was an amazing game. I was on the visitors side while the comeback was happening. I had a very strong feeling that Central would come back and strike. When Thomas caught that ball at the end zone, SJA was shocked. There was a dead silence and all I could hear were the roars on the other side. It was a truly a happy ending, winning the homecoming game and keeping our winning streak to 5 games. It was the homecoming miracle.