TORRANCE — Ryan Young was ready to do whatever he needed to in order to help Torrance get past Segerstrom in Friday’s CIF-Southern Section Division 10 first-round game.
Young took the handoff on a designed draw play, hit the hole and raced 56 yards for the score that helped Torrance jump out to a three-touchdown lead.
“It felt like I pulled my hamstring,” Young, who had ice packs on both hamstrings following the game, said. “I couldn’t go down and knew I had to give my best to get into the end zone.”
Top-seeded Torrance went on to roll past Segerstrom 30-7, setting up next week’s meeting on the road against Redlands.
“We knew it was going to be a tough night with it being playoffs,” Young said. “And we know it’s ‘dog eats dog’, so we came in with the same energy the whole week of practice.”
Torrance (7-4) got a much-needed spark from Malakai Johnson to start the game.
Johnson took the opening kickoff 45 yards and after Young ran for gains of 16 and 8, Tartar quarterback Connor Sherring hit a wide-open Johnson for a 10-yard touchdown and an early 7-0 lead.
“We knew we had to have a quick start and get the motion going,” Johnson, who also finished with 43 receiving yards, said. “If we had a good defense the offense would keep on rolling.”
After its defense forced a turnover on downs, the Tartar offense was back at it.
This time, it was Sherring’s turn.
The Torrance play caller took the designed quarterback draw, hit the seam and raced 48 yards past the Segerstrom defense to give the Tartars a 14-0 lead with 48 seconds left in the opening quarter.
“Friday was about gameplan and execution. We knew what we were going to get, and knew we had to take advantage,” Torrance coach Raymond Carter said. “We told Sherring he was going to have to play big (Friday), and that’s what he did. He stepped up big time.”
Sherring finished with 90 rushing yards, including another 45-yard pickup early in the third quarter that set up Jake Silverman’s 5-yard touchdown run to give Torrance a 27-7 lead. Sherring also threw for 59 yards.
Young finished with 122 yards, including 103 in the first half.
Segerstrom (6-5) came out of halftime looking for a spark, and it got one. After its offense was held to 105 yards in the first half, Jaguar quarterback Jesse Lopez and Nick Cervantes connected on a quick-out route that went for a 75-yard touchdown.
That was all Segerstrom’s offense was able to muster. The Jaguars turned the ball over on downs four times, were forced to punt three times and fumbled once.
“Our plan was to stop the run and (Segerstrom’s) misdirections,” Johnson said. “We stopped the pass a little bit, but we focused on the run.”
Carter saw a renewed focus during the week, knowing what the Jaguars offensive focus was.
“We’ve been getting hurt in the run game, and we took it on ourselves to buckle down and stop the run,” Carter said. “And that’s what our guys did (Friday).”
