It’s amazing how certain things happen regularly in the present that one takes for granted but you remember when the trend started just how big the achievement was.
From 1987-1999, Justin-Siena High football had just one homecoming win. Keep in mind, the program struggled mightily from 1987-1996, going 27-69-1 in an era that saw four head coaching changes before Rich Cotruvo arrived in 1997. Yours truly played on some of those bad teams. Believe me, we were bad.
Setting the scene: Cotruvo had an accomplished head coaching career at Monte Vista High (Danville) before coming to Justin to become its head coach shortly before the 1997 season. From 1997-1999, the Braves went 14-17 with one postseason appearance. Through the program was not what most people know it as now, one could tell that a new era had dawned at Justin. Before 2000, Cotruvo strengthened his coaching staff with Steve Vargus, Steve Hatton and Jim Costan. All three joined the Braves staff after resigning (or getting pushed out, depending on who one believes) from Vintage High.
That season would also be the dawning of a new era because the Braves would be going from the CIF Sac Joaquin Section to the North Coast Section. The Superior California Athletic League disband and Justin would join the Marin County Athletic League. The MCAL consists of schools twice Justin’s size in enrollment.
On a mid-October night in 2000, Justin entered its homecoming game with a 4-1 record and seeking a rare homecoming win at least in recent memory. Thanks to John DiMichele’s 32 carries for 196 yards and two touchdowns along with timely defense, the Braves escaped with a 21-19 win over the Sir Francis Drake Pirates.
The 2000 season also dealt a curveball to the Braves because starting quarterback Steve Andres broke the femur bone in his leg in the season-opener against St. Helena. Mike McNamara then took over as Justin’s signal-caller.
Thumbnail sketch of the game: The Pirates struck first and took a 7-0 lead before Justin scored 21 unanswered points with McNamara rushing for one touchdown and DiMichele adding two more. Drake, however, did not go quietly as quarterback Todd Hauserman threw for one touchdown and ran for another.
One of the extra points were blocked, which then meant after Drake cut the lead to 21-19 with 1:53 left in the game, the best the Pirates could do was tie the game. Therefore, Drake was forced to go for the two-point conversion. On the two-point conversion, Hausermann rolled right but was under heavy duress. Zac Dollar, Justin’s outside linebacker playing what is known as the “strike backer” in Vargus’ system sacked Hausermann.
The Braves, however, were still not out of the woods but Matt Hamilton recovered the onside kick. Four plays later faced with fourth and 3 from the Drake 40, Cotruvo could have either punted and forced the Pirates to drive the length of the field or gone for the first down. He chose the latter and DiMichele iced the game with a six-yard run.
What it meant: As far as the short-term, not much because Justin went on to lose three in a row to drop to 5-4 heading into the season finale at Tamalpais. The Braves needed to win that game to secure a playoff spot.
Justin destroyed Tamalpais 38-0 to improve to 6-4 and earn the No. 5 seed in the NCS Class A playoffs. The Braves went on to defeat John Swett (Crockett) 28-7, top-seeded Kelseyville 34-21 and Ferndale 16-14 to win what would become the first of six NCS titles in a 14 year span under Cotruvo.
Two years later, Costan rejoined Vintage’s coaching staff as an assistant under Les Franco while Hatton joined Napa High’s staff as an assistant for Jerry Dunlap and now Troy Mott. Vargus (aka “Varg”) remains a mainstay on Cotruvo’s staff.
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