Santa Fe Indian School quarterback Alec Lee launched a last-ditch effort, looking for an open wide receiver hovering near the left sideline. The ball flew out of bounds, hitting the ground with a thump.
The Pojoaque Valley High School sideline roared. Players picked up one another and threw their fists in the air. The entire scene looked like a championship moment out of a sports movie, but Pojoaque is anything but close to a state or district title.
The Elks celebrated their first win of the season, a low-scoring affair against Santa Fe Indian School, Sept. 28, that culminated in a homecoming victory to the tune of 8-6.
The win puts Pojoaque’s season record at 1-5, and it ended the eight-game losing streak that stretched on from last season.
“It seems that every year that I get my first win, it is always so tough,” Pojoaque head coach Jorge Oropeza said. “Every year that I have been a head coach, it has always been down to the wire.”
The scoreline was 0-0 for the majority of the game, before running back Ben Lujan opened his scoring account for the season in the third quarter.
Sophomore Isaiah Leyba-Moya did most of the dirty work leading up to the touchdown, pounding a couple of big runs on the left side.
First, he had a 35-yard run through an outside hole that took the Elks from their side of the football field to the opposite 29-yard line, with a penalty added into the mix.
Then, Leyba-Moya broke three tackles with a similarly-planned run, to land his team on the six-yard line. Pojoaque was beat back on a couple of plays, before Lujan broke free on an inside run to give the Elks six points.
“I saw the hole that my boys opened up, my tackle and my guard, and I ran through that hole as hard as I could, and I didn’t stop until they threw me up in the end zone,” Lujan said of the touchdown run.
After that, the Elks went for the two-point conversion. Freshman quarterback Bryan Martinez, who made his first career start for Pojoaque, threw the ball to an open Michael Ciddio in the back of the end zone, to give Pojoaque an 8-0 lead in the middle of the third quarter.
For the remainder of the third quarter and the start of the fourth, Santa Fe Indian School challenged Pojoaque’s defense with quick runs and passes for short gains, but penalties and lapses in protection kept the Braves clear of the red zone.
Late in the fourth quarter, the Braves were able to secure a string of runs that took them to the 3-yard line.
They had a number of routine runs for effective gains, in addition to one misdirection sweep that gave the Braves a 31-yard chunk. They ran that same play a couple of times throughout the course of the game and Pojoaque was unable to match their defense to the play.
“On our offense, we call it a rocket counter,” Oropeza said. “And it’s hard because you are hoping that your tackle is going to fill instead of chase … but our defensive tackle kept chasing.”
When the Braves got to the 3-yard line, they attempted to hammer the ball into the end zone with inside runs. With an underwhelming offensive line, Santa Fe Indian School ran two running plays for no gain.
A quarterback sneak gave the Braves the scoring edge and Lee took the ball in for a touchdown.
To match Pojoaque on the scoreboard, the Braves went for a two-point conversion, but their pitch to the left side was met with a firm tackle five yards from the end zone.
Santa Fe Indian School had one more possession in the game to try to pull out a win from the contest.
The 50 seconds remaining on the clock were too few for them to construct a dangerous drive, and they were left with little hope in their own half as time expired.