LA CAÑADA >> In the first year that St. Francis High School’s stadium was renamed after late coach Jim Bonds, the Golden Knights are going to celebrate it by playing at home in a championship game.
St. Francis held on to beat La Serna 20-0 on Friday in a CIF Southern Section Division 4 semifinal. It will host Long Beach Poly in the championship game.
It will be the program’s second title game since 2017 when Bonds was on the sidelines for a last-minute loss to Rancho Verde.
Golden Knights senior Max Garrison, who rushed for a 100 yards on 16 carries with a touchdown, got emotional talking about what it meant with Bonds always on everyone’s mind.
“It gives me chills just thinking about it,” Garrison said. “I know he’s watching over all of us.”
While it wasn’t the greatest night offensively, it was enough for St. Francis (10-2), seeking its first section championship since 1964.
“Defensively, we’ve had some struggles here and there, but they carried us tonight,” Herrington said. “Our offense didn’t play very well at all, and I give La Serna some credit for that. But the defense kept us in it and we got enough points. I’m just so happy to go to the finals.”
Herrington’s going to enjoy it before thinking about Long Beach Poly.
“I haven’t seen any film or anything (on Long Beach Poly), we had our hands full tonight,” Herrington said. “We know they’re athletic and big and we’ll be the underdog. So, we’ll play loose and see what happens.”
For La Serna (10-3), nothing went right. All-purpose senior threat Jake George had two touchdowns called back on penalties, and the Lancers fumbled near the goal line with just over five minutes left when they could have made it a one-possession game.
“It was frustrating at times tonight,” La Serna coach Andy George said. “We made some mistakes and you can’t give a team like that more opportunities. It just wasn’t our night, that’s a solid football team. I wish them the best moving on, the sand just ran out for us and we have nothing to be ashamed of.”
Both teams struggled to finish drives in the first half, both failing on fourth down tries inside the 25 and St Francis’ Mayze Bryant came up with an interception in the first quarter to stop a Lancers’ drive.
Finally, the Golden Knights were able to take a 3-0 lead on Clint Geryak’s 27-yard field goal with 26 seconds left.
La Serna nearly stunned St. Francis on the ensuing kickoff with Jake George returning it 95 yards for a TD, but it was called back with 13 seconds left on a blocking penalty and it remained 3-0 at the break.
The Golden Knights opened the third quarter with a 75-yard drive that ended with quarterback Jack Jacobs plowing in from a yard out for a 10-0 lead.
Jake George appeared to answer with a 32 yard TD reception, but it was called back on an illegal formation penalty, negating his second TD of the night.
After Geryak added a 24-yard field goal with 8:55 left to extend the lead to 13-0, the Lancers had a chance to make it a one-possession game, but Owen Long fumbled near the goal line with 5:42 left, and then Garrison added a 5-yard touchdown run with just over a minute left to finish it off.