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Coronado's fleet footed running back, Sam Brown, pulls away from defenders en route to a big gain after making a deer like move to bounce outside.
Photo: Brax/VPC Matrix
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Westside Bowl 2009:
Undefeated Thunderbirds Claw Cougars - Win 3rd in a Row.
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Cute play on words but it was the T-Birds that did the mowing at the 15th Westide Bowl.
Photo: Brax/VPC
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Page 1 of 4.
2009 Westside Bowl Photo Gallery .
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W
estside rivals, Coronado and Franklin once again put it all on the line and fought for the district crown at the Sun Bowl Stadium at the campus of the University of Texas at El Paso. But, even if the score was anything but close, the 15th annual Westside Bowl was full of great Texas high school football.
The Coronado Thunderbirds capped a perfect regular season with a mighty performance in dismantling the Cougars from Franklin. This victory put the cherry on coach Don Brooks' illustrious career as the T-Birds completed a perfect 2009 regular season.
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Coronado cheerleaders getting the fans ready to turn up the volume.
Photo: Brax/VPC |
Coronado came in to the Westside Bowl hoping to finish undefeated. Does this senario sound familiar? In 2006, a rag tag Franklin team in the shawdows of one of the greatest El Paso teams ever, the 2005 Cougar team, were facing the then undefeated Coronado T-Birds. No one gave the Cougars a chance and yet they pulled off the improbable upset and beat the highly ranked T-Bird team in overtime.
But if you thought that this game was going to be anything similar to the 2006 game... or that Coronado would be denied an undefeated season again; you'd have been wrong. From the outset, the Cougars were in trouble. On their first possession Franklin could only muster 1 first down as Franklin QB Josh Valenzuela was a bit too pumped and kept throwing high and imcomplete and the Coronado defense was not giving up any rushing yardage.
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Coronado Thunderbirds burst onto the field... S M O K I N'.
Photo: Brax/VPC |
Then Coronado took the punt and literally marched down the field as if they were leading a parade. The T-Birds stuck to the girl that "brung" 'em to the dance... a pulverizing running attack, tenacious defense and an occasion pass to the flats. In other words ball-control football at it's best.
On their first offensive possesion, Coronado did what they do best and ran the ball like a bulldozer for good yardage with running back Sam Brown being called on for 2/3 of the run downs. When the Cougars started to stack the box to stop the run, QB Cole Freytag hit his receiver on the left side for 20-yards moving the ball into Cougar territory.
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Coronado fans feelin' it.
Photo: Brax/VPC |
Then to finish the one-two punch, Freytag handed the ball off to full back Zack Thomas who rammed the ball right up the middle for 15 more yards. Then it was more of Brown who took off like a deer and got the ball down to the 3-yard line from where he scored on the next play.
Coronado 7 - Franklin 0.
Franklin again was shut down by the ferocious Coronado "D". But, the first quarter ended with only the 7-0 score. But, the T-Birds got the ball back and continued where they left off in the first quarter. The plan? Keep leaning heavily on the Frnaklin defense with plenty of running mostly by Brown and also a good dose of quarterback keepers by QBs Albert Monzon who was seeing action along with Freytag.
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Coronado defense allowing only a few Cougar big gains.
Photo: Brax/VPC
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But, the Cougar defense stiffened when the T-Birds reached the red-zone and Brown was stopped for no gain so Monzon took it himself and ran over the left tackle scoring from the 5-yard line.
Coronado 14 - Franklin 0.
2009 Westside Bowl Photo Gallery .
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To continue to Page 2 .
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Prepared by WL staff.
Photos: Brax/Valley Publishing Company
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