Prep football: Folsom quarterback Tyler Tremain’s grit leads Bulldogs past De La Stomp
The last time these teams played, Tyler Tremain was nearly cut in half.
They almost had to sew him back together to keep his organs in place. He was battered and bruised by the bruisers from Contra Costa County, carried off the field on Oct. 8 in a nonleague meeting of powerhouse programs, like a scene out of a gladiator movie.
Some seven weeks and a lifetime later, there was Tremain again, Folsom High School’s courageous quarterback, taking another brutal shot against the same team known for delivering haymakers for 40 solid seasons of football excellence. This one was in the fourth quarter of this stirring CIF Northern California Division I-AA Regional championship in Concord on Friday night, against those guys, otherwise known as the De La Salle Spartans. The senior absorbed a shot that made everyone lining Owen Owens Field flinch. He rolled over and rested on his knees for a moment, trying to collect himself and wondering if he also needed to collect teeth and limbs.
“I got killed on that play,” Tremain would say later, allowing for a half smile and an expression of profound pride and relief.
Tremain shows grit in win
This Tremain fellow? He’s a cockroach in the most flattering sense. Stomp him, sack him, belt him, chase him. Nothing finishes him off. Tremain was the man of the hour, the man for this historically great 28-27 victory for Folsom over a juggernaut of national renown, with records and achievements that are hard to fathom, including being an unclearable hurdle for the best programs in Sacramento over 40 previous meetings.
Tremain is 5-foot-10 and 170 pounds of grit and skill. He’s also the nicest guy you’ll meet, until you have to stop him on a football field. He earned this one with a touchdown pass to Austin McMillan and three touchdown runs, including the game-winner on a 3-yard bolt for a 28-21 lead with 2:12 to go to cap a classic Tremain/Bulldogs march. His Bulldogs earned it the hard way, including defense. It wasn’t all Tremain, but let’s be clear about this: The Bulldogs don’t get here and don’t win this without Tremain. Make sure that man is on the team bus every week.
After it was over, Tremain wobbled a bit, this time from sheer spent emotions. He passed for 244 yards and ran for 66. All of this from a guy who hurt his left non-throwing shoulder in the first De La Salle meeting. It was damaged enough to keep him out of the final three regular-season games, two of them losses, and made running in this one a risk. De La Salle players weren’t going to ease up on him. Quarterbacks are a juicy target in the open field. The Spartans sized up Tremain like chum thrown to the sharks. Only this time, the sharks couldn’t devour him.
Tremain is now 16-1 as a varsity quarterback, avenging his lone setback. He is 4-0 in these playoffs with one more game to go, the CIF State finals Friday night at 8 p.m. against Cathedral Catholic of San Diego in Mission Viejo. From a 6-0 start to the season, to the 31-10 loss to De La Salle in which Tremain was knocked out of the game and missed the end of the regular season, a stretch that included two losses, to this. In a word: Whoa.
History vs. De La Salle
Teams that finish third in their league do not do this to De La Salle. They do not dance and celebrate on De La Salle’s turf in as big of a regional win as there’s ever been. But this is Folsom. The Bulldogs arrived some 12 years ago with their first state championship, and they’ve truly arrived now. They now seek their fifth state championship since 2010.
“It’s insane,” Tremain said softly. “Just crazy fun. I don’t know if any of us really thought this could happen.”
That doesn’t mean the Bulldogs doubted themselves. But to beat De La Salle is a tall order. Folsom tried five previous times and got handled in four of them, including in NorCal title bouts in 2012 and 2013 that emphatically ended 14-0 seasons for the Bulldogs. Michigan-bound star Zeke Berry knocked Tremain out of the first game with a blitz up the middle, and he was sensational Friday. Berry had a 55-yard option touchdown pass early, and he pulled in a 42-yard touchdown strike with 1:44 to play. But he was stopped on a 2-point conversion run attempt.
Kudos to De La Salle for going for it, and more kudos to the Bulldogs for denying him the end zone, inches short. The Bulldogs recovered the onside kick and, fittingly, it was Tremain who ran out the clock, who had the ball last, and who kept that ball as he hugged well wishers well into the night, some he wasn’t sure he even knew.
“Special player, special team,” Folsom coach Paul Doherty said of Tremain and his team. “Just wow.”
Wow is right. This was a historically significant triumph for the Sac-Joaquin Section. De La Salle had gone 20-0 against the best of the Sac-Joaquin Section since 2012, including St. Mary’s of Stockton, Del Oro, Granite Bay, Jesuit, Central Catholic of Modesto and, of course, Folsom. Now the records show 20-1.
A great win
This was a great moment for Doherty, a good guy and a terrific coach who said earlier in the week he felt the “pressure of the world on me.” It’s not easy taking over for Folsom coaching greats Troy Taylor and Kris Richardson, now working their magic for Sacramento State as the Hornets kick off another playoff march. This was a great win for public schools, for the kids who didn’t beat De La Salle before but showed up for a peek at this one, such as Arizona State running back and former Folsom star Danyiel Ngata.
It was also a great win for players who could not compete. That would be Lucas Wolfe, the heart and soul of this program if Tremain isn’t all of that and more. A star receiver/linebacker for Folsom, Wolfe collapsed after a section playoff win at Jesuit, later diagnosed with an enlarged heart. He was told by doctors to not engage in any rigorous exercise for at least six months. So there he was, in full uniform Friday, ready to go and knowing he could not go.
“I asked my doctor if I could at least suit up,” Wolfe said.
It was good for his spirit. Friday’s victory also healed Tremain fully. Payback works wonders for aches and pains. His father said as much. Bob Tremain has followed the journey of his football sons since the start. One was destined to play linebacker, Josh, and the other to play quarterback. They, like a lot of Folsom players, grew up in the Junior Bulldogs program. For all the unwarranted cries that Folsom wins only because it recruits or cheats or takes in bus loads of transfers doesn’t wash when the core of the team is still rooted in Folsom’s youth programs.
When Tremain took that hit against De La Salle in October, his career flashed before his eyes. Now he doesn’t want the ride to end.
“Tyler told me after the first De La Salle game that he couldn’t let his career end this way,” Bob Tremain said. “I tried to talk Tyler out of playing quarterback when he was growing up, to play other positions, because at Folsom, it’s hard to become that guy with all the great quarterbacks that have come through. In seventh grade, he said he had to play quarterback because “that’s who I am.”
He showed it this season. He showed it Friday. He’ll show it again and again until there’s nothing left in that tank.
This story was originally published December 4, 2021 at 4:32 AM.