High school football championships: Oak Ridge hopes to end 20-game skid vs. rival Folsom
It’ll happen sometime in our lifetimes, we can assume, maybe sooner than later: Oak Ridge will beat Folsom in a high school football game.
It hasn’t happened in the last 20 attempts for the Trojans of El Dorado Hills, dating back to 2006. There have been close games down to the wire in the meeting of Highway 50 rivals, and there have been blowouts in league or postseason play.
The next opportunity for Oak Ridge is within grasp, on Friday night at Hughes Stadium in the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division I championship game to cap a triple-header of football fun at Sacramento City College.
New-school wonder Twelve Bridges of Lincoln takes its 12-0 record against Casa Roble (11-1) with an 11 a.m. kickoff in D-V. Grant (10-2) seeks a repeat in D-III in facing upstart Woodcreek (11-1) of Roseville, which seeks its first crown in its first title appearance in a 3 p.m. contest.
And then the big boys rumble, teams hailing for schools with nearly 3,000 students with spirited student sections and decades of tradition. Scores of players from those programs have played in college and in the NFL. The pipeline has not dried up a bit. The programs since 1986 have combined to reach 24 section finals, winning 16. Folsom has Oak Ridge’s number. There is no way around it. The streak includes the Bulldogs beating the Trojans in section D-I finals in 2013 (49-17) and 2022 (23-13).
When Folsom (10-2) and Oak Ridge (10-2) met in a Sierra Foothill League opener on Sept. 29, the teams were Bee-ranked No. 1 and 2. Folsom turned a 14-14 game early in the fourth quarter into a 42-21 victory at home with breakaway plays, engineered in large part by Bulldogs quarterback Ryder Lyons, a who knows a lot of players at Oak Ridge from his youth in El Dorado Hills.
Immediately after that SFL game, there was postgame chatter of a rematch.
Folsom coach Paul Doherty told his Bulldogs after Friday night’s 36-29 victory over Inderkum in a semifinal that the turnovers and penalties have to stop or Oak Ridge will end their season in short order.
In his third season coaching at his alma mater, after winning section championships at Del Oro and Capital Christian, Casey Taylor has embraced the challenge of ending Folsom’s stranglehold. He’s already had a season to remember, winning his 200th game, against Del Oro of all opponents. The coach said Oak Ridge wants to keep Friday’s game close heading into the fourth quarter, and then anything goes.
“We’ve gotten closer, but close isn’t good enough,” Taylor said of closing the gap. “We played them in the section finals last year, and then everyone got into the weight room to get ready for this season. We’re trying to finish in everything. Finish workouts. Finish games. Finish seasons. We have 23 seniors, and they’ve really been our rocks..”
Oak Ridge won the D-I title in 2019 under longtime coach Eric Cavaliere, though the Trojans did not face Folsom. The Bulldogs were defeated in a semifinal by Monterey Trail. Oak Ridge won the title behind Bee Player of the Year Justin Lamson, now a quarterback at Stanford, in the rain at Hughes Stadium.
Included in the Oak Ridge senior group this season are versatile leaders in Fresno State-bound tackle Ethan Dasmann and college prospects Markus Hoffman and Gavin Malloy. The senior group of 23 live in El Dorado Hills. The majority of that group grew up playing together with the Junior Trojans feeder programs. The seniors beat Folsom teams in the fifth and sixth grade — they kept receipts — and during their freshman season. They believe that their time has come.
Folsom has 16 starters who played in the Junior Bulldogs program. Those players also believe they will three-peat as champions.
Even Oak Ridge principal looks the part
The 6-foot-5, 285-pound Dasmann and the powerhouse 6-2, 250-pound Hoffman are anchors on the lines and the 6-3, 225 Molloy bounces all over at linebacker. He was in on 10 tackles, 1 ½ sacks and two interceptions in a 31-14 semifinal win on the grass and dirt of Central Catholic of Modesto.
The Trojans soak in the weight room, an element that transformed the team from a three-win group in Taylor’s first season of 2021 to a section finalist the last two seasons. Hoffman has the best biceps in the section, we’re sure, like a guy who throws tractor tires around the yard to loosen up. Even Oak Ridge principal Aaron Palm looks the part in a polo shirt, including Monday at the 13th section championship breakfast, which featured representatives from all 14 finalists.
“Yes, we love the weight room at Oak Ridge,” Molloy said. “In fact, we already got in a lift this morning before (the breakfast). Mr. Palm doesn’t lift with us, but he seems to know his way around a gym as well.”
Molloy added: “Can’t wait for Friday. I love our guys and we will give Folsom a battle. Our class has beaten them multiple times before over the years and now its time to do it for our whole community.”
Hardeman family clout
A family name long rooted with the Folsom program can be traced to the trenches. Lucas Hardeman is a 6-foot-2, 235-pound defensive tackle whose value and impact this season go beyond his six sacks and 17 quarterback hurries. Hardeman is a rarity in that he is the first four-year starter in program history. To put that in better perspective, consider that Folsom’s first powerhouse team wasn’t in the 2000s. It was the 1962 group that finished as the No. 1 ranked team in Northern California.
“No one’s ever done that,” Doherty said of being a four-year Bulldogs varsity starter. “That speaks of the special player that he is. He’s crazy good.”
Hardeman’s oldest brother, Tyler, is a 6-3, 280-pound senior defensive lineman at Sacramento State and a two-year starter for the Hornets, who open NCAA FCS playoff action Saturday at North Dakota.
The brothers talk regularly and watch each others teams live often. Tyler Hardeman has been a role model for what he has accomplished, including earning Sacramento Bee Defensive Player of the Year honors in 2018 in addition to SFL Defensive Player of the Year accolades. Folsom won back-to-back CIF state Division 1-AA championships in going a combined 30-1 with Hardeman holding his own, and then some, on the lines.
Championship games
Friday’s games at Hughes Stadium
D-V: No. 1 Twelve Bridges (12-0) vs. No. 2 Casa Roble (11-1), 11 a.m.
D-III: Grant (10-2) vs. Woodcreek (11-1), 3 p.m.
D-I: No. 1 Folsom (10-2) vs. No. 3 Oak Ridge (10-2), 7 p.m.
Saturday’s games at Hughes Stadium
D-VII: No. 1A Ripon Christian (12-1) vs. No. 1B Woodland Christian (12-0), 11 a.m.
D-VI: No. 3 Bradshaw Christian (10-2) vs. No. 4 Hughson (9-3), 3 p.m.
D-II: No. 1 St. Mary’s (11-1) vs. No. 2 Rocklin (11-1), 7 p.m.