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PAGE A10, KEIZERTIMES, SEPTEMBER 9, 2016 KEIZERTIMES.COM ‘Gus’ returns to McNary LIFE OF W iley Celtics show fi ght in Week 1 One game in, it is way too early to tell if McNary is a contender in the Greater Valley Conference. But one thing is for sure—the Celtics will not go down without a fi ght. They proved that again and again Friday, Sept. 2 in a come-from-behind 38-35 win over North Salem that was as exciting as any high school football game you will see. Playing on the road, McNary could not have gotten off to a better start. After the Celtic defense forced a three- and-out, the offense marched down the fi eld to take a quick 7-0 lead. But the Vikings defense stopped McNary on 4th-and- goal from the 1-yard line and answered with 21 straight points, taking advantage of two McNary turnovers, to lead by two touchdowns with 15 seconds remaining in the fi rst half. Instead of taking a knee and regrouping, McNary tried to grab the momentum going into halftime. At midfi eld, quarterback Josiah Gilbert, who had just thrown an interception that led to a Vikings touchdown, stepped up in the pocket and rocketed a Hail Mary to Brendan Van Voorhis, who boxed out his defender to come down with the football in the end zone. Down 35-24, the Celtics chances of winning their season opener looked even more inauspicious with 7:21 remaining in the fourth quarter. But McNary, again, did not give up. Gilbert got the Celtics within fi ve points on a 1-yard touchdown run, the defense got a quick stop and then Marc Baiza scored the game- winning touchdown. “I am just relieved and so happy,” Gilbert said after the game. “I can’t even explain to you how happy I am to see us come back and battle, keep our noses in it and keep pushing and pushing, keep the tempo going. We just came together as a team. We just zoned in.” Head coach Jeff Auvinen was impressed by the comeback. “It’s competitive. It’s a will to win,” he said “I saw some things in my team I didn’t know were there. It’s defi nitely exciting.” McNary will fi nd out just how good it is the next two weeks with the home opener Friday, Sept. 9 against back-to- back league champion South Salem and then a road game versus Sprague, who certainly looked the part in Week 1, handling the Saxons 48-7. But no one should underestimate the Celtics, especially not their fi ght. At least not after Week 1. Just ask North Salem. (Derek Wiley is the Associate Editor of the Keizertimes. Opions expressed are those of the writer) KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley Gustavo Villalvazo, No. 3, returned to the McNary boys soccer team after tearing his ACL last October. By DEREK WILEY Of the Keizertimes McNary got one of its cap- tains back. Less than a year after tear- ing his ACL, senior Gustavo Villalvazo returned to the fi eld Thursday, Sept. 1 to help the Celtics shut out Lebanon 7-0 for their fi rst win of the season. “I’m back, never felt bet- ter,” Villalvazo said. “The team was excellent. They were per- fect in every way, high pres- sure, defensive wise, offensive wise, ball control, possession, everything was good. It felt good to be back.” Villalvazo suffered the season-ending injury on Oct. 13 in a 3-3 tie against Forest Grove and McNary went on to lose three of its fi nal four games. While rehabbing the knee through physical therapy fi ve days a week, Villalvazo thought of his teammates and returning for his senior year. “We have a bunch of good guys and I just wanted to play with them and make this town proud,” Villalvazo said. McNary head coach Miguel Camarena said Vil- lalvazo’s ability to control the pace of the game was the key to the Celtics win over Leba- non. “When I see a kid work- ing that had to come back and play the game, I love it,” Ca- marena said. “This is a kid that can play at the next level and I’m happy to have him back.” After scoring one goal on a penalty kick in its fi rst game, McNary put on an emphasis on fi nishing, which paid off almost instantly as the Celtics scored two goals in the fi rst fi ve minutes against Lebanon. The fi rst goal came from Jesus Lopez a little more than four minutes into the game. Bryan Keo then gave the Celtics a 2-0 lead just 30 sec- onds later. Please see GUS, Page 14 Celtics come back (twice) By DEREK WILEY Of the Keizertimes SALEM—With four sec- onds remaining in the fi rst half, McNary quarterback Josiah Gilbert threw a prayer into the end zone to Brendan Van Voorhis, who was able to haul it in for a 52-yard touch- down. But the magic didn’t end there, not even close, as the Celtics stormed from behind to defeat North Salem 38-35 in their season opener. Trailing 35-24 with 7:21 left to play, McNary went on a 12-play, 61-yard drive to give itself a chance as Gilbert fought his way into the end zone from the 1-yard line to get the Celtics within 35-30 with 4:10 remaining. After the McNary defense forced a three-and-out, the Celtics offense went back to work as Marc Baiza had a 3-yard touchdown run and two-point conversion to give McNary its fi rst lead of the second half with a 1:23 re- maining in the game. The Vikings didn’t stop fi ghting and after a defensive pass interference penalty on an underthrown ball, got into Celtics territory. But McNary’s defense held strong forcing three incom- plete passes with a quarter- back sack in between to end the game. “That fi nish is why you (play the game),” McNary head coach Jeff Auvinen said. “It’s quite an adrenaline rush. I was just really proud of the kids for never giving up and even though we were strug- gling on defense and strug- gling a little bit on our pen- alties and turnovers, we could have let that get us down but you saw the end of the fi rst half, we continued to battle. KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley McNary junior Lucas Garvey intercepts a North Salem pass in the second quarter of a football game played Friday Sept. 2. On offense, Garvey also rushed for 131 yards and a touchdown in a 38-35 victory. Fourth quarter obviously was a great quarter for us.” The 11-point defi cit in the fourth quarter wasn’t the only double digit one the Celtics had to overcome. McNary trailed 21-7 late in the fi rst half after North Salem turned two Celtic turnovers into touchdowns. The Hail Mary from Gil- bert to Van Voorhis just before halftime got McNary to with- in one score. “I just saw my man (Van Voorhis) down fi eld and I gave him a shot,” Gilbert said. “He came down with the football and we were all ecstatic. That was a great play and defi nitely took the momentum into the second half.” Van Voorhis wasn’t sure if Gilbert was going to get the pass off but kept running to- wards the end zone. “He was scrambling around a little bit,” Van Voorhis said. “I was kind of thinking he was going to get sacked but then he threw it up. I adjusted to it in the air, the defender didn’t make as good an adjustment and I caught the ball and after I caught the ball, I tried to fi nd out where the end zone was, if I needed to push, I was in the end zone, so I just fell over and scored.” Please see BACK, Page 14 McNary thinking redemption in home opener By DEREK WILEY Of the Keizertimes Sam Farr, a senior on the McNary offensive line, hasn’t forgotten about last season’s game against South Salem, a 56-12 loss to the Saxons. “It’s defi nitely a redemp- tion game because of the loss we had last year,” Farr said. “We’re looking to gel together as a team and come away with a win. I know every single person on this varsity football team wants to win and that’s, I think, what is going to carry us.” The Celtics actually led 12-0 a year ago before South Salem answered with 56 straight points. “We played them good for a half last year,” McNary head coach Jeff Auvinen said. “The second half was a nightmare. They played well. We fell apart. It was a combi- nation of factors that weren’t very good.” McNary hosts the Saxons Friday, Sept. 9 in its home opener at 7 p.m. South Salem coming off back-to-back Greater Valley Conference championships but return just one starter on defense and only four linemen and running back Francisco Ramirez-Perez on offense. The Saxons are breaking in a new quarterback in Harri- son Broadus. Even playing at home, South Salem had growing pains in Week 1, falling to Sprague 48-7. Ramirez-Perez rushed for 82 yards and the team’s only touchdown. Broadus com- pleted just four of 14 passes for 22 yards and an interception. “I think they are trying to see who they are,” Auvinen said. “It looked like they were kind of getting used to var- sity speed, kind of like we are. They are not as talented as they were last year. They were pretty good up front. They had a great quarterback. They had a great pair of receivers. I think it’s going to be a good game. I think they do a lot of things that we do. I think it’s going to be a good battle.” Auvinen added that the Saxons skill players are similar to North Salem’s, who Mc- Nary defeated to open the season, but that he liked the Vikings running backs a little more. “Up front, they are very comparable to North,” he said. McNary offensive lineman Caleb Kiefi uk-Yates defi nitely isn’t overlooking South Sa- lem after its blowout loss to Sprague. “I think they’re still a good football team because they’ve had a good program built up,” he said. “I don’t think we’ve had our best games against them. If we can just play as a team, I think we have enough play- ers if we put it all together and have a good game against them we should be able to beat them.” Auvinen wants to see the Celtics clean up some things in their second game of the season, especially on defense after allowing three touch- downs of 40-plus yards to North Salem. “We need to get more dis- ciplined on defense,” Auvinen said. “We had a lot of guys doing their own thing. We need to get to our assignments and work as a unit, trust each other, everybody individu- ally doing what they should do. I thought we came out and played hard. I thought we competed but have a lot of mistakes to clean up.”
