SALINAS—While the North Salinas High football team contemplates where it might be next year—MBL Pacific or Gabilan division—there’s no doubt where San Benito High is headed.
The Haybalers, who have reached the Central Coast Section Division I championship game the last two years and three times in the past five years, will get a chance to make yet another run to the finals after being seeded Sunday into the five-division post-season field along with 39 other teams.
San Benito tuned up for the playoffs Thursday night by drubbing the Vikings 40-6 at Rabobank Stadium.
The Balers reached the title game in 2012 and 2013 with just a .500 regular-season record, and this time they’ll take a deceiving 6-4 mark into the eight-team D-I bracket.
Though Hollister will likely finish in fifth place in the MBL Gabilan Division with a 3-3 record, it could just as easily have been 6-0. A missed field goal cost the Balers a loss to Salinas, they fell to Monterey in the final seven seconds and lost to Alvarez in overtime.
But the Balers overcame those tough losses by handing Palma its only loss of the season last week, and dominated a weakened Viking team that lost its eighth straight to finish 2-8 overall and 0-6 in league.
North Salinas, which lost a few key players in the last three weeks of the season for various reasons, will likely know in early December what division of the equity league it will play in next year after the Board of Managers makes its annual review and vote. The Vikings went 7-3 overall and 5-1 last season playing in the MBL Pacific, the lower of the two levels.
San Benito, meanwhile, unleashed a thundering herd of running backs against North Salinas. The Balers, who have stuck to their game plan of 20 years under coach Chris Cameron, where they grind out victories on the ground with a heavy-handed defense, used 11 running backs who rushed 52 times for a combined 361 yards to beat the Vikings.
Hunter Nye and Justice Felice did most of the work. Felice rushed 12 times for 87 yards and one touchdown while Nye had 12 carries for 90 yards. He rushed for one score—a 22-yarder in the second quarter and caught a 16-yard touchdown pass from R.J. Clark early in the second quarter.
Chris Blake scored a pair of San Benito touchdowns in the first quarter on runs of six and two yards. He finished with 33 yards on five carries.
North Salinas was held to minus-10 yards rushing, but took a surprising 6-0 lead when lead when Abraham Casas picked up a loose ball at the Viking 24 on the Balers opening drive of the game, and before the Hollister players realized what happened, he was long gone.
North Salinas then recovered the ensuing kick when it bounced off a Baler, but the drive stopped four plays later.
With the score 6-6, the Vikings very nearly scored another stunning touchdown when linebacker Armando Armenta came out of a goal line stand with the ball and was tripped up by the only Baler defender who had a chance to stop him.
However, after a lengthy discussion the officials ruled the Baler ball carrier had crossed the goal line. It put Hollister up 12-6.
From there the Balers used interceptions by Diego Fisher and Bryan Noble to score another two quick touchdowns to help take an insurmountable 33-6 lead at halftime.
