The Verdugo Hills Dons, the No 4 seed in the CIF City Section Open Division, hosted the No 5 seed Birmingham Patriots on Wednesday afternoon in a battle of two defending City Section champions. The Patriots came in as the defending Open Division champions, while the Dons won the D1 title last season. These teams faced off in early September and battled to a 0-0 tie, with both rueing missed opportunities. Birmingham would have a similarly bitter taste in their mouth following this rematch where the Dons capitalized on their miscues, including an early interception for a 12-0 Verdugo Hills victory.

“We knew if we took care of the ball, we’d be ok defensively.” Said Dons coach Darren Fitzgerald. “We have so much speed defensively and they play their roles.They’re a very good team, so to knock them off was huge for us. Just two great teams playing each other. (The first meeting was a) 0-0 tie and fortunately for us a 12-0 game where we had some athletes that made plays. They kind of dropped some balls and helped us out a little bit, but defensively we were pretty solid.”

The Dons scored early, on a designed double pass where senior Emily Wagner connected with Meadow Moore for a 33-yard touchdown. The point after was a pass that did not connect, and Verdugo Hills held a 6-0 lead five minutes into the game. Both teams traded punts for the next few possessions before the Dons broke another big play.

“(Moore is) amazingly fast, and she has a knack.” Fitzgerald said of his junior. “She’s played flag football growing up, so she has a knack for where to go to get to the ball and she’s an incredible flag puller.”

Senior Julianna Sarabia, who had the Dons interception earlier in the game, broke a beautiful 60-yard run down the right sideline for a touchdown. The two-point conversion pass was unsuccessful, leaving the Dons with a 12-0 lead with 5:15 left in the first half. 

“She’s made huge play after huge play for us all year,” commented Fitzgerald when asked about Sarabia’s contributions, “I think she has 19 interceptions, and 8 or 9 for touchdowns. In a big game she always makes a big play, and she had a 60-yard run, so obviously that was huge.”

The Verdugo Hills defense continued to put pressure on Patriots’ quarterback Malea Tonga, forcing rushed throws and short completions that the Dons swarmed to when the passes connected. This pressure, along with multiple dropped passes throughout the game, kept Birmingham from generating any momentum on their offensive possessions.

“We didn’t catch the ball well today,” said Patriots coach Jim Rose, “I don’t think we pulled flags well today, and when you’re in the playoffs that’s all she wrote. When you don’t show up in the playoffs, you’re on vacation.”

Verdugo Hills seemed content to run out the clock during their possessions in the second half, and Birmingham looked to put together a scoring drive late. Leaning on senior Melanie Mora and junior Bella Gonzalez, the Patriots eventually got the ball deep into scoring territory only for the Dons defense to hold and get possession back. Verdugo Hills ran out the clock and they now move on to face No.1 seed San Pedro in the semifinals next Wednesday afternoon.