Last week, Kaiser settled for a 15-15 tie with Downey Warren, but not by its own choice.
Here’s the situation as told to me from Kaiser coach Phil Zelaya:
Warren scored the game’s first touchdown and went for 2 to go up 8-0. Kaiser answered and also went for 2 to tie the score, 8-8.
Then Kaiser scored again, this time kicked the extra point to go up 15-8. Warren answered right back and quickly went down the field to score a touchdown with about 25 seconds left.
“It looked like they were going to go for 2,” Zelaya said.
It was big Warren crowd, a “White Out” night for the fans and coach Raul Lara, the former coach at Long Beach Poly decided to kick the extra point. It was successful and the game finished in the tie although Kaiser nearly had a chance to win in the final seconds.
Some preseason games have overtime, by mutual agreement from coaches, but most do not. Coaches want to play 48 minutes, but don’t see the need to play extra time, risking injury, in a game that likely has no bearing on whether or not they make the playoffs.
So what would Zelaya have done?
“I would’ve gone for 2,” he said.
Yes, a tie is better than a loss. But don’t you want your team to see you’re willing to go for it? I would’ve gone for the win, too.
