No. 5 Salpointe (8-2) at No. 4 Mesa Mountain View (10-1)
Date: Friday
Kickoff: 7 p.m.
Salpointe coach: Pat Ryden (8-2, first year at Salpointe; 14-16, third year overall). Became the first Salpointe coach in history to win his first playoff game on the field in his first season as head coach last week when the Lancers beat Gilbert Williams Field 31-28 in a first-round game. Eric Rogers won his first playoff game as a Salpointe first-year coach in 2020, but it was a forfeit by Scottsdale Saguaro because of COVID-19 restrictions.
Mountain View coach: Andy Litten (10-1, first year at Mountain View; 75-39, 10th year overall — including 36-28 record at Marana from 2012-17). Litten, a native Tucsonan who graduated from Marana Mountain View and went on to walk on as an offensive lineman at Arizona, coached Scottsdale Horizon to the 5A state championship over Salpointe in 2021.
When Salpointe has the ball:
Run percentage: 59.8 percent (290 rushes)
Pass percentage: 40.2 percent (190 passes)
Ryden has utilized two quarterbacks, mentioning often that the Lancers are not adversely affected by doing so. Rayce Alvarez, a junior, is a pure passer who has completed 69 of 118 attempts for 1,054 yards with nine touchdowns and four interceptions. Matthew Avelar is more of a dual-threat quarterback who has passed for 797 yards (45 completions in 76 attempts) and rushed for 281 yards on 34 carries. … RB Richard Rivera has carried the bulk of the load with 141 rushes, totaling 864 yards with five touchdowns. Multi-skilled Nathan Spivey is next with 342 yards on 61 carries with eight touchdowns. … WR Morgan Quiri, who has committed to Western Illinois, leads Salpointe with 33 catches for 707 yards and five touchdowns. … Litten’s defense has young standouts with four juniors among the team’s top five tacklers — LB Reign Curiel (team-high 66 tackles), DE Caleb Larson (56 tackles, 21 for loss), CB Myron Christenson (53 tackles) and SS Brody Anderson (48 tackles). Senior LB Beckham Barney has 56 tackles (8.5 for loss). … Larson leads Mountain View’s defense with nine sacks and nine quarterback-hurries. … Christenson and Curiel are among the team leaders with two interceptions.
When Mountain View has the ball:
Run percentage: 58.2 percent (316 rushes)
Pass percentage: 41.8 percent (277 passes)
Brady Goodman, another standout junior for Litten, has completed 37 touchdown passes with only four interceptions. He has 2,232 passing yards while completing 145 of 216 attempts. He has also rushed for 386 yards on 61 carries with 10 touchdowns. … RB Reese Bodily, a senior, has gained 1,186 rushing yards on 131 carries with 13 touchdowns. … Junior WR Talan Arnett has 43 catches for 888 yards with 20 touchdowns. Goodman has actually passed more to senior WR Mikey Sumko (46 receptions for 670 yards and seven touchdowns). … Salpointe senior LB Thomas Regina is yet another standout Regina with the Lancers after his brother Luke was a standout as a senior five years ago. Thomas Regina leads Salpointe with 95 tackles, 9.5 for loss. He has a team-best 5.5 sacks. Spivey, a safety, is next with 64 tackles and LB Dinos Drossos has 59 (eight for loss). … Spivey and FS Richard Archuleta each have three interceptions. … Spivey, who has 10 interceptions in his career, averages 36.7 yards per kickoff return. He has two interception returns for touchdowns and also one on a kickoff return and punt return.
Series record
Salpointe leads 2-1 with the last meeting two seasons ago when the Lancers topped the Toros 26-0 at home.
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator five years ago and is presently a special education teacher at Gallego Fine Arts Intermediate in the Sunnyside Unified School District
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