No. 1 La Salle rallies for win at 8th-ranked White Swan

WHITE SWAN -- On the eve of his top-ranked team's showdown with dangerous White Swan, La Salle senior Jake DeGooyer had a rather interesting dream.

"I dreamed it was raining just like this," DeGooyer said in a steady downpour Friday night. "The lights weren't good, everything was dark."

One of the reasons the Lightning's night turned out to be a dream very much like DeGooyer's -- instead of a nightmare -- was DeGooyer himself.

On an awful night for football, one that saw the teams combine for nine fumbles and nearly 200 yards in penalties, DeGooyer managed to catch nine Mike McGree passes for 186 yards and two touchdowns in La Salle's 25-16 Central Washington 2B League victory.

His first reception went for a 50-yard touchdown that opened the scoring, and his eighth catch, a 26-yarder with 10:46 remaining, gave La Salle a two-score lead.

Not that that was necessarily going to be enough. Because while La Salle certainly lived up to its No. 1 spot in the state poll, White Swan looked much better than its No. 8 ranking. Call the Cougars, say ... No. 1A.

"They're a great team," said McGree, who finished with 253 passing yards and also ran 38 yards for another touchdown. "We had to play a great game to win."

"(The Cougars) came out and played just tough as heck," said La Salle coach Jack McMillan, whose 5-0 team had to rally from a 16-6 second-quarter deficit. "They did a couple things that we didn't deal with too well. They had us off-balance."

Less than two minutes after DeGooyer's first touchdown, White Swan took the lead on an 85-yard run by Cesar Hernandez and then Hernandez's two-point conversion pass to Aldrin Dimilanta. In the second quarter, the Cougars (4-1) drove 74 yards in seven plays -- overcoming two of their 11 penalties on the way -- with Hernandez hitting Dimilanta from nine yards out for the touchdown. Another two-point conversion pass made it 16-6.

The Lightning didn't stay down. McGree's surprising touchdown run on what started off as a simple quarterback keeper off right guard got La Salle back into it, and then Tony Cacchiotti put the Lightning ahead with a one-yard plunge that capped an 11-play, 85-yard drive to open the second half.

But that drive was indicative of just how evenly these teams were matched, and how much the game twisted and turned on luck, coincidence and weather. On the second play of the drive, White Swan had a clear interception -- a ball that went through receiver Ross Anderton's hands and ended up in the hands of Hernandez, playing defensive back, inside the Lightning 25-yard-line. Inexplicably, it was ruled an incomplete pass, and the Lightning proceeded to march downfield for the score.

Both teams seemed bedeviled by bad luck. White Swan might well have led 22-6 in the first half had not the usually sticky-fingered Dimilanta -- who would later make a circus catch worthy of Saturday afternoon, if not Sunday -- dropped a would-be touchdown pass on fourth down from the La Salle 2. The Cougars also saw numerous big gains called back by their 106 yards in penalties. And La Salle was just as snakebit, having one touchdown called back by penalty and losing four fumbles, two of them deep in White Swan territory.

"It was pretty hard to hold onto the ball," McGree said. "The only time the ball wasn't wet was at the beginning of the game."

In the end, the difference was the passing and catching of McGree and DeGooyer, stellar in the rain -- "astounding" was McMillan's description -- in a game that might easily have been played deep into November.

"This was not a playoff game. We're still alive," White Swan coach Andy Bush said. "But this is what playoff games look like."

La Salle 6 6 6 7 -- 25

White Swan 8 8 0 0 -- 16

LaS -- Jake DeGooyer 50 pass from Mike McGree (run failed)

WS -- Cesar Hernandez 85 run (Aldrin Dimilanta pass from Hernandez)

WS -- Dimilanta 9 pass from Hernandez (Ralph George pass from Hernandez)

LS -- Mike McGree 38 run (pass failed)

LS -- Tony Cacchiotti 1 run (pass failed)

LS -- DeGooyer 26 pass from McGree (Ian Hayes kick)

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING -- La Salle, Tony Cacchiotti 17-112, Zane Switzer 11-42, Mike McGree 9-40, Matt Kuribayashi 4-10, Tommy St. George 1-3. White Swan, Hernandez 12-151, Eric Nanez 19-84, Moises Contreras 2-18, Tremain Fiander 1-4, Dimilanta 1-(minus 2), team 1-(minus 10).

PASSING -- La Salle, McGree 11-18-1-253. White Swan, Hernandez 7-13-1-90, Olivia 2-8-0-46, Dimilanta 0-1-0-0.

RECEIVING -- La Salle, Jake DeGooyer 9-186, Ian Hayes 1-49, Matt Smith 1-18. White Swan, Aldrin Dimilanta 3-55, Ralph George 2-30, Contreras 3-39, Fiander 1-12.

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