Mayor’s Cup stays with Merced after rout of Golden Valley

Ulonzo Gilliam and some of his Merced High School teammates were still on the field, posing for pictures with the Mayor’s Cup trophy almost 30 minutes after Friday night’s game ended.

It wouldn’t take long before the trophy was pictured all over social media.

The Bears were basking in the euphoria of a dominant 44-14 victory over Golden Valley at Veterans Stadium. There was a sense of relief that they weren’t the team that broke the streak against their crosstown rival.

For the 11th straight year, the Mayor’s Cup is headed back to Merced High.

“The streak is always on your mind,” said Gilliam, who scored four touchdowns. “This is our 11th Cup win in a row. You try to treat it just like any other game. We’ve always competed against that team. We know each other. We know we’re going to come out and give it our all.”

While the pressure to continue the streak was on Merced (7-3, 4-2 Central California Conference), the Cougars (5-5, 1-5) came in with everything on the line.

Not only was Golden Valley trying to defeat the Bears for the first time since 2005, but the Cougars were also trying to gain that elusive sixth win so they could qualify for the playoffs for the first time since 2006.

Golden Valley just couldn’t get out of its own way. The Cougars committed four turnovers, and costly false-start penalties in the first half took away short-yardage situations on third and fourth down in Merced territory. Golden Valley drove into Merced’s half of the field four times in the first half and came away with zero points.

“We don’t want to take anything away from Merced; they took it to us,” Cougars coach Dennis Stubbs said. “We made too many mistakes. We’re a better team than we showed tonight. We just had some head-scratching mistakes.”

The defense did its part early to keep the Cougars in the game, limiting the Bears to two Gilliam touchdown runs in the first half.

The Bears had their own problems getting into an offensive rhythm early. Gilliam did the heavy lifting in the first half, accounting for 103 of Merced’s 167 total yards.

Defensively, Merced harassed Golden Valley quarterback Armando Muzquiz all night, sacking him six times and hitting him over and over. Merced also held Cougars running back Isaiah Montanez to 51 yards on 14 carries.

“I thought our defense was unbelievable,” Merced coach Rob Scheidt said. “It carried us when our offense wasn’t very effective in the first half. I knew our guys were playing hard. It was just a matter of making plays.”

Golden Valley recovered a fumble on the second-half kickoff and cashed in with a 5-yard touchdown pass from Muzquiz to tight end Brady Mello to cut the Bears’ lead to 16-6. Then, Merced started making plays.

Jake Foss completed a 35-yard pass to Stephen Williams to set up a 9-yard touchdown pass from Dhameer Warren to Tanner Pellissier that extended the Bears’ lead to 23-6 with 6:18 left in the third quarter.

Gilliam delivered the dagger with a 70-yard punt return for a score that gave Merced a 30-6 lead with 3:22 left in the third.

The third-year varsity star later caught a 12-yard touchdown pass from Foss and finished with 165 rushing yards on 19 carries.

“I talked to him (Friday) and told him just to be a man tonight,” Scheidt said. “There was supposed to be some scouts watching him tonight. He’s just a great kid. He’s a special talent.”

The Bears will open the Sac-Joaquin Section Division III playoffs at home Thursday against Beyer (7-3) at 7 p.m..

“For us, this is the right thing at the right time,” Scheidt said. “We needed a victory where we imposed our will. I thought that was very important. Hopefully, now we can take that momentum into the playoffs.”

This story was originally published November 5, 2016 at 12:35 AM with the headline "Mayor’s Cup stays with Merced after rout of Golden Valley."