A celebratory but anxious vibe inside Willie’s Pizza and Wings — filled with players, coaches, parents and fans of the Turlock High School football program — quickly deflated on Sunday afternoon. While watching the livestream of the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section football playoff selection show hosted by assistant commissioner Will DeBoard, the Journal’s Joe Cortez and the Sacramento Bee’s Joe Davidson, the two-time defending Central California Athletic League champion Bulldogs learned that they were given the No. 6 seed in Division 1.
In the 12-team bracket, that means that the Bulldogs, who went 7-3 overall and 5-0 in the CCAL, will not have the week off and instead have to play a first-round game at 7 p.m. Friday at Joe Debely Stadium against the No. 11 Laguna Creek Cardinals of Elk Grove, who are 5-5 overall after a 4-2, a third-place finish in the Delta League. The five teams seeded in front of Turlock in order are Folsom, Oak Ridge (El Dorado Hills), Central Catholic (Modesto), Inderkum (Sacramento) and Granite Bay. The first four of that list are off until the quarterfinals on Nov. 15.
Turlock was considered a top five D-1 program in the section for most of the season by MaxPreps.com, as well several fans (though they may be slightly biased towards the hometown team). Unfortunately for the Bulldogs, the rankings and the opinions of Turlockers don’t hold as much weight as the ones of the folks working over at CalPreps.com, the website that the selection committee uses to help determine playoff seeding. The eight-man committee consists of section staffers, retired section administrators, athletic directors and others.
DeBoard explained during Sunday’s broadcast that the committee first considers the CalPreps rankings for each of the seven divisions, which all consist of 12 teams. They then take into account head-to-head matchups between other playoff teams, whether they are in or outside of the section. If they are still having trouble determining seeds, they then consider league finishes and strength of the league.
“It has to do with the strength of their league,” he said of Turlock. “The discussion in this division, by far, was between four, five and six. One was Folsom, two was Oak Ridge, Central Catholic was a three…”
Folsom is 9-1 this year, including a 56-14 win over Turlock on Sept. 13, and are searching for a section four-peat. Oak Ridge, who have been Turlock’s playoff kryptonite by eliminating them four times in the past six years, is 6-4 overall, but 6-1 in the Sierra Foothill League — the only loss coming 35-7 against Folsom. Central Catholic is 7-3 and went 5-1 in the Valley Oak League. After dropping games to St Mary’s of Stckton and Portland’s Central Catholic in the preseason, they lost 31-14 to Manteca in the second week of conference play. Inderkum was handed the final bye slot after a dominant year in the Capital Valley Conference, where they tied for the league title with Christian Brothers after the Falcons won a 37-26 thriller on Sept. 20. Granite Bay, meantime, went 7-3 while having similar results against section powerhouses as Turlock did this year, losing 30-17 to Oak Ridge, 35-21 to Rocklin and 48-10 to Folsom, but had the advantage of playing in the Sierra Foothill League. Aside from the aforementioned Folsom loss suffered by Turlock, the Bulldogs lost 41-28 to Rocklin to open the year.
If it makes the Bulldogs feel any better, No. 7 Monterey Trail was also a league champion that will have to play on Friday. The Mustangs went undefeated in the Delta League, but didn’t go through quite the preseason gauntlet as Turlock, though they did play Inderkum to a 27-21 loss.
“The committee's job is to put all that together and hopefully do something that makes a little bit of sense,” DeBoard said. “And sometimes we do, and sometimes there are teams that are not so happy.”
Shortly after the bracket was revealed, the Turlock Quarterback Club posted a graphic promoting Friday’s game with the caption reading “Bet.” Among younger generations, the term is slang for “challenge accepted.”
That challenge comes in the form of a high-powered, well-balanced Cardinals offense. They have rushed for 1,823 yards and passed for another 1,643. The running game has been led by senior Armon Thorntona, who compiled 1,065 of those yards. As for the passing game, they yardage has been split between seniors Mitchell Labrado and Owen Burke. Labrado is the second-year starter and has tossed for 980 yards. Early in the season and In his relief throughout league play, Burke threw for 663 yards. But the defense hasn’t been as consistent. As the Cardinals have scored 334 points, they have allowed 298. The flaw were highlighted after two of their five losses were by one score.
The Laguna Creek defense will have their hands full once more against Turlock, who have a dynamic offense led by reclassified freshman quarterback Scout Silva. In his first year, the 5-foot-7, 155-pounder broke the program’s regular season passing record with 2,105 yards and 24 touchdowns. The dual-threat also ran for 479 yards and 10 scores. His main target has been senior Junior Silva, who hauled in 34 catches for a THS regular season record 862 yards and 11 touchdowns. Their defense is also good, allowing a league-best 156.4 yards and 5.2 points per game.
The winner will have a date with Central Catholic in Modesto next week.
Hughson, Hilmar and Denair get home games
Not only will Denair be appearing in their first section playoffs in five years, they will also be hosting their first home postseason game since 2019, when they fell just short of a second straight SJS D-7 title after losing 17-14 to Mariposa County in overtime of the championship game. Still in the Division 7 bracket, the Coyotes were given the No. 7 seed after a .500 year that saw them go 3-3 in the Southern Athletic League and 5-5 overall. Coming to Jack W. Lytton Stadium will be No. 10 Delta of Clarksburg, who went 6-4 overall and 4-2 in the Sac-Metro League. The two teams have one common opponent, the Southern League’s Gustine. The Saints lost 45-12 to the Reds on Sept. 6 while three weeks later, the Coyotes beat Gustine 24-13.
Also with a home game on Friday in the Division 5 bracket, despite finishing sixth in the Trans-Valley League with a 2-4 league record (4-6 overall) and ending their regular season on a three-game losing streak, is No. 6 Hilmar. Taking the short trip to McSweeney Field to take on the injury-plagued Yellowjackets will be their former TVL rival, No. 11 Livingston, who had a 5-5 regular season record, including going 4-3 in the Western Athletic Conference.
At the top of the D-5 bracket slated to host a game at Husky Memorial Stadium in the quarterfinal round is Hughson, who after a 10-0 regular season, awaits the winner of No. 8 El Dorado versus No. 9 Lincoln. The Huskies will be gunning for their third straight section title.
