Nathan Mollat / Daily Journal Burlingame’s Ilan Lesov rushed for 125 yards and two TDs on 23 carries during the Panthers’ 28-12 win over Half Moon Bay Friday.

With a 28-12 win over visiting Half Moon Bay on Friday, the Panthers enter next week’s Little Big Game versus San Mateo in control of their own destiny. In fact, that game will have everything riding on the line: The Peninsula Athletic League Ocean Division championship and with it the division’s lone automatic postseason berth.

“I can’t wait (for the Little Big Game),” Philipopoulos said with a smile. “It’s going to be fun. Tonight’s game was huge. Everytime we’ve hit a valley this season, the team has responded in a big way.”

And Burlingame (3-1 PAL Ocean, 7-2 overall) certainly was in the dumps after last week’s gut-wrenching 21-14 loss to Menlo School.

“After that loss the kids were in tears, the coaches in tears, and it would’ve been easy to mope all week in practice,” Philipopoulos said. “But the kids did what they’ve done all season — they responded.”

And they did it against an always-tough Half Moon Bay (3-2, 6-3) squad. The Cougars lost despite outgaining the Panthers 346-247. Half Moon Bay committed two key penalties on two of Burlingame’s touchdown drives, the Panthers’ Max Elia returned a kickoff 81 yards for a score and the Burlingame defense pitched a shutout in the second half.

“We’re making the same mistakes we made in Week 2, and that’s not going to cut it against big teams,” Half Moon Bay coach Matt Ballard said. “We need to progress more (from the) midseason (point on). ... They (Burlingame) beat us up front. They were fired up to beat us and they did. They stuffed our offense so give them credit.”

Last year it was the Cougars who did the beating, as they pounded the Panthers into submission in a one-sided affair. Philipopoulos remembers the sick and helpless feeling of watching his team get hammered in the trenches.

But the Panthers were able to turn the tables this time around, especially in the second half. The first half was basically a stalemate. Burlingame scored first only to see HMB score the next two TDs, the last on Josh Dunne’s 38-yard scoring run, giving the Cougars a 12-7 lead with 11:01 left in the second quarter.

But Elia returned the ensuing kickoff 81 yards for a score, jumping high to pick up the bouncing ball at his own 19-yard line in the center of the field. Elia then found a seam down the left sideline en route to the end zone. The play gave Burlingame a lead it would never relinquish.

“That was the changing point of the game,” Philipopoulos said. “The momentum swings and we rode that to victory.”

Said Ballard: “Special teams once again is really our detriment. We tend to shoot ourselves in the foot.”

The Cougars put together some solid drives in the second half, but could never finish them. A lack of execution combined with some stellar Burlingame defense resulted in HMB going scoreless in the final 24 minutes.

“In the second half we couldn’t execute our offense at all,” Ballard said. “Our defense could only hold (them down) so much.”

Said Philipopoulos: “Our defense has been outstanding all season long: underrated, unheralded and I think tonight we proved our point.”

Leading 21-12, the Panthers capped the game’s scoring on Ilan Lesov’s 12-yard TD run with 4:53 remaining. Lesov went over center before breaking two tackles and making a nifty cut at the 3 before scoring. Burlingame’s Derek Atlas came up with an interception on HMB’s ensuing possession, all but sealing the outcome.

Dunne led HMB with 92 yards on 15 carries. Miles Jacobsen had a strong performance, completing 10-of-14 passes for 119 yards. But it wasn’t enough to overcome Burlingame’s two-pronged running attack of Lesov (23 carries, 125 yards, two TDs) and Jordan Pessah (12 carries, 91 yards). Panthers quarterback Nik Gutierrez was ultra efficient, going 5 of 6 for 41 yards, all in the first half.

“That’s how we like it,” Philipopoulos said, referring to the fact that his team didn’t attempt a single pass in the second half. “That means we’re running the ball well. They (Half Moon Bay) kept hitting us, but we just kept getting up and ran right at them.”

Burlingame probably played its best overall game of the season. Punter Tommy Fallon had a pair of 62-yard punts to pin HMB deep in its own end. Combine the special teams play along with the offense and defense and it’s no wonder Philipopoulos was one happy camper.

“We finally put a game together for all four quarters in all three phases of the game,” he said. “And because of that and only that we were able to win this football game. This couldn’t have come at a better time. After a loss like last week you can question yourself on what you could’ve done differently to win the game. But all of that is erased now.”