The Centralia football team started its season off on the right foot on Friday night, running away from South Whidbey in a dominant 42-0 victory.
“It was awesome,” Centralia coach Tyler Gedney said. “They came out and executed, and it was fun to see. I had a really young group last year, and they’re starting to grow up.”
Bill Volavola opened the scoring on Centralia’s first drive of the game, weaving around defenders before eventually reversing field on a 57-yard touchdown run.
On the next possession, Jeremy Frady scooped up a South Whidbey fumble and returned it 63 yards for a touchdown to put the Tigers up two scores.
“They were moving the ball a bit, so it was huge to get that,” Gedney said.
Outside of that possession, South Whidbey struggled to move the ball against the Centralia defense. By the end of the night, the Tigers had allowed just 94 yards of total offense, including just 36 passing yards on 11 attempts.
“I was proud of them for being able to hold the line after the first couple of drives,” Gedney said. “(South Whidbey) did some good things. The guys got back on the IPad with (assistant coach) Eric Snelson and shut it down the rest of the day.”
Frady added two touchdown receptions later in the game, both from Caden Erickson, and both Ruben Silvestre Gonzalez and Andres Coronel found the end zone with short touchdown runs.
Volavola finished with 107 total yards and his touchdown, and Enzo Montee tallied 68 rushing yards on just seven carries. Erickson finished 7 for 9 through the air with 54 yards and his two touchdown passes to Frady, who added a third catch and finished the night with 18 receiving yards.
Centralia (1-0) will be back at home again next Friday, Sept. 11, to host R.A. Long. In a meeting in Longview last season, the Tigers won 35-0.
A win next week would put Centralia at 2-0 for the first time since 2016, according to MaxPreps.
“That’d be big for us,” Gedney said.
