Serra Padres fall to Mater Dei in CIF football state finals

“Yeah,” Walsh said. “Absolutely.”

But it was Walsh’s hoarse voice, still full of energy, of fight, of zeal for the sport of football, that spoke volumes about the 2021 Serra Padres. Mater Dei (12-0) is a different beast entirely, a beast capable of dismantling a Serra team that entered the game having outscored opponents 424-167 and turning the tables on them.

Aside from two third-down conversions on their opening drive, the Padres (11-2) were never in it. The Mater Dei defense sealed off the middle of the line to keep Serra running back Petelo Gi from establishing any early momentum. The Padres were finally forced to punt, and the Monarchs needed just three plays to find the end zone.

Three plays later, the Mater Dei defense doubled the lead with an interception for a pick-6. Three plays after that, the Monarchs recovered a Gi fumble deep in Padres territory, leading to another quick score. At which point it would have been easy for the Padres to fold. But they didn’t.

“We could have tapped out so many times in this game, and we didn’t,” Walsh said. “And that’s something to be proud of.”

Gi personified that pride. While the Monarchs outgained the Padres 341-205, the senior running back remained the workhorse he’s been all season. Gi belied his 5-9 stature by totaling 25 carries for 116 yards.

“Petelo is a straight dawg,” Serra quarterback Dom Lampkin said. “He’s one of the best running backs out here, nobody can stop him. You seen what he did against the No. 1 team in the country. So, just imagine what he can do against anybody else.”

But the night belonged to Mater Dei quarterback Elijah Brown. The sophomore — on the heels of Alabama quarterback Bryce Young being named the third Heisman Trophy winner Mater Dei school has produced — looked every bit the part at the helm of the Monarchs’ offense.

Elijah Brown was 18-of-25 passing for 243 yards and two touchdown passes. His first scoring pass came on Mater Dei’s third play, a 78-yard bomb to senior Cooper Barkate. He’d cap the night with a 5-yard TD pass to senior Quincy Craig in the fourth quarter.

The Monarchs possessed the ball just three times in the first half but scored on all three. After Malakai Te’o’s pick-6 to make it 14-0 in the first quarter, Mater Dei took advantage of a Serra fumble with senior running back Raleek Brown diving in for a 1-yard score, and the Monarchs led 21-0 with 1:31 left in the first quarter.

After Mater Dei kicker Chase Meyer booted a 32-yard field goal with 5:19 to go in the first half, the Monarchs rode a wave of momentum into the locker room when their defense stuffed Lamkin’s attempt at a quarterback sneak from the 1-yard line on the final play of the half.

Once again, Walsh’s message, this time to his team, was a simple one at halftime.

“Keep swinging, keep fighting,” he said.

That they did, but so did the Monarchs.

Raleek Brown totaled 11 carries for 61 yards and three touchdowns, and even capped a 3-yard scoring run in the third quarter with a celebration dance that drew a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. He’d add a 15-yard TD at the end of the third quarter for good measure.

Lampkin got to the end zone for the Padres’ lone score, and 18-yard scamper around the right side as he beat one defender to find something his offense saw precious little of — room to run.

But there were several other highlights for the Padres. On Mater Dei’s first play of the second half, senior defensive end Seamus Gilmartin stripped the ball and Serra recovered the fumble. And late in the third quarter, senior safety Andrew Stewart broke up a pass in the end zone by elevating between the receiver and the ball to bat it away.

“I lost track of him for a little bit but then I got back on him,” Stewart said. “I saw the ball and I just jumped up and I should have picked it. … Honestly, I just saw the ball and was just trying to make a play.”

Stewart’s clutch defense was reminiscent of the final drive of the Central Coast Section Open Division championship game, when the Padres won 16-12 by denying St. Francis several pass attempts downfield.

“After the game at St. Francis, everyone was pumped up, just ready to rock and roll,” Stewart said. “And when we got the announcement that we were going to play Mater Dei, we just knew we had to lock in. We didn’t get the result we wanted today but I’ll remember this team forever, and what we stood for as people, more importantly.”

To know what Serra stood for as people, look no further than senior Hassan Mahasin. Unable to suit up throughout the playoffs after season-ending knee injury, Mahasin was in attendance Saturday, as usual, sporting his game jersey and acid wash jeans. Mahasin has missed neither a play not a practice throughout Serra’s postseason run.

“It was sad because, everybody, we all dream this and it came true,” Gi said. “But the sad part is one left out. He wasn’t able to have this dream. But he was happy that we got here, but it would have been better if he was here (playing).”

Serra’s long and winding road to the State Championship Bowl — the team’s fourth in the past six years, and its first in the Open Division tournament — was rife with peril. The Padres’ scheduled Week 1 game with Pittsburg was canceled due to wildfire smoke. Then came the heartbreaking end to Mahasin’s season Oct. 2 against Bellarmine.

Those two distressing events were at least within the scope of possibility for a modern-day football team. But no one could have anticipated the terror in the closing minutes of the CCS championship game when gunshots rang out from the parking lot of Westmont High School. In what turned out to be an isolated incident outside the stadium, most everyone inside was left facing the horror of imagining something much, much worse until order was restored some minutes later.

At the end of it all, the Serra Padres chartered a private plane and flew to Southern California to match up on the biggest stage California high school football has to offer. And as the teams broke from the postgame locker room, a tearful junior, Serra lineman Ryan Silver, was the first to emerge. And he explained his tears, so obviously filled with sorrow, with a word belying that feeling — “joy.”

“It’s just the joy of this team, how far we came with this unit, and I wouldn’t have wanted to do it with anyone else,” Silver said. “So, I’m just so proud of what we accomplished this year. We made it to the state finals and that’s as far as we can go.”