Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
HERRIMAN — Jaxson Reiser took the snap out of shotgun, faked the handoff going to his left, and spun right around his tackle and toward the sideline.
The senior quarterback veered up field, put his shoulder into the end zone, and crossed in his second touchdown of the night. The Mountain Ridge signal caller then spotted a camera in the back of the end zone, teased it with a shrug reminiscent of the emoji on his phone, and returned upfield to celebrate.
When you're going off in a historic playoff victory, you can do what you want after a touchdown. But only because Reiser's offensive line let him do what he needed to do.
The University of Utah baseball commit threw for 106 yards and two touchdowns and ran for another score to help the 13th-seeded Sentinels hold off No. 20 Westlake 28-25 in the first round of the 6A state playoffs Friday at Mountain Ridge.
"When your line is letting you do what they want, I guess I just saw the camera and went with it," Reiser quipped. "I owe it all to the big boys up front. I saw the holes they were making and just followed them."
The offensive line also helped Semisi Kinikini run for 170 yards and a touchdown on the ground for Mountain Ridge (7-4), which helped head coach Mike Meifu to the first playoff win of his career.
It's not often life hands you a second chance, but that's exactly what the Sentinels got after a 43-42 loss to Westlake way back on Sept 9, before the Thunder went 0-5 in a loaded Region 4 that includes Corner Canyon, Skyridge, Lone Peak and American Fork, which will host Mountain Ridge in the second round.
"We said pregame that you don't get very many second chances," said Meifu, who improved to 19-23 in his four years at Mountain Ridge. "We were disappointed in how we played them earlier in the year, and so to come back and get this win feels really good,"
The Sentinels — and Reiser, specifically, who accounted for 21 of his team's 28 points — took exactly what their offensive line gave them.
In all, Mountain Ridge ran on 47 offensive possessions to just 19 passes, but when Reiser needed to use his arm, they bought him time in the pocket, as well.
After Coleson Quiring's interception, Westlake (2-9) came back through Aidan Bayless' 14-yard TD strike to Aidan Hammond to equalize. Reiser then found Peyton Jones with a 43-yard wonder strike on third down to take a lead the Sentinels would hold through halftime, including a blocked field goal at the buzzer en route to the 14-10 advantage.
Reiser opened the second half with his touchdown run before the dual-threat pitcher/outfielder found Jones for a second touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter to go up 21-10.
"Every week has been a growing experience for him," Meifu said of his quarterback. "It's his first year being in our program so every week he keeps getting better. Today was really all about the offensive line. It doesn't matter who had the ball, we were able to execute and see the game out in the end."
The Thunder rolled back when Bayless found Ezra Heiner for a 15-yard score over a defender to pull within three with 9:40 remaining.
But Westlake ran out of time, thanks in large part to Kinikini's control on the run-heavy, 5:15-long final drive that bled the clock over a dozen plays.
Mountain Ridge will travel to face No. 4-seeded American Fork next Friday at 6 p.m. MDT.
