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Prep football: Poway High faces San Pasqual for berth in section championship game

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By Michael Bower

A trip to Qualcomm Stadium and a spot in the CIF San Diego Section Division I championship game is one win away for the Poway High football team.

And to make it all the sweeter, the Titans have a chance to earn their first trip to The ‘Q’ since 2007 by beating the one team that ruined their chance at a perfect year – San Pasqual.

No. 1 Poway (10-0-1) will collide with the No. 4 Eagles (8-2-1) Thursday at 7 p.m. at Poway High in the SDS Division I semifinals. The two met back on Sept. 23 and the result was a 17-17 tie.

San Pasqual erased a 10-point deficit in the final six minutes, hitting a 40-yard field goal as time expired to pull the Eagles even with the Titans. San Pasqual celebrated the tie, while the Titans were clearly disappointed.

But there will be no ties in this one and only one team can move on to the championship game. Poway is feeling pretty good about its chances, as the Titans will have a few key players back that missed the game with San Pasqual the first time around.

Quarterback Gabriel Isaak, who was forced to sit out against the Eagles in the first meeting with concussion symptoms, will be back along with speedster running back Evan Gray, who has been out since Sept. 16 with a fractured knee.

“We are going to be at full strength,” Poway coach Damian Gonzalez said. “We had our third string quarterback in the first time. We were really handcuffed without Isaak. Now that we have him, we can run all of our stuff. There are a lot of different formations we can use now.”

Gray provides another running threat to an already potent ground attack, which features Nehemiah Gross, Ryan Moreno and a few others. The plan is for Gray, who gives Poway a real home-run threat, to get about 10 to 15 touches in the game.

“He is such an impact player,” Gonzalez said. “Every time he touches the ball good things happen and even when he is not touching the ball he is a phenomenal decoy.”

Gray, a senior, is excited about the opportunity to contribute.

“Every single game I am on the sideline and I get so pumped up,” Gray said. “Now I finally get to actually play and it is going to be so great.”

San Pasqual, which runs the triple-option offense, clearly had the most success this season against the Titans. Eagles quarterback Tyler Tony is a dual threat. He can beat teams through the air with his arm and on the ground with his feet. He did a little of both in the first meeting to guide the Eagles to the comeback tie.

“There offense is so unique,” Gonzalez said. “Nobody else runs it the way they do. Tony is just so athletic and he runs the offense so well. They give you so many different looks and the different things they can do with the ball presents a challenge.”

The Eagles had only 11 passes in the first meeting before putting it in the air 12 times on the final drive of the game, which resulted in the tying field goal. But the Eagles were able to control the clock most of the game with their running attack. They twice moved the ball inside the 20 of Poway, but the Titans were able to recover a fumble and pick off a pass to end those threats.

“There are some things that we definitely learned from playing them,” Gonzalez said. “We went back and studied the film to find out what is going on and since then we have improved.”

The winner of the game will face the winner of Thursday night’s other semifinal contest between No. 3 Vista and No. 2 Eastlake on Monday at 7:30 p.m. at Qualcomm Stadium.

Poway is searching for its first section crown since 2007.

“When I was young, I use to watch the high school games on TV when they got to the ‘Q,’ Isaak said. “I would think that it must be the greatest thing playing there. But right now we have to focus on San Pasqual. Once we do that, then we can focus on the ‘Q’ and what we have been working so hard for our whole high school career.”

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