Bye, Bye, Streak
Chandler finally beating Hamilton set the stage for some exciting matchups.
For 17 games and 15 years, Chandler was waiting for the time it would finally beat Hamilton.
They finally did on Oct. 4, 2013.
Later that year, Hamilton looked to get back on top.
Both the Wolves and the Huskies would remain undefeated through the remainder of the regular season to pin themselves on the same side of the AIA state playoff bracket and set up a destined matchup in the state semifinals.
“Obviously, we wanted that game and we wanted a rematch,” Hamilton quarterback Sam Sasso said. “But we also knew that this playoff game is really what matters, getting to that state championship. We knew we were the first team to lose to Chandler, but we realized that in the long run, that doesn’t really matter. It’s what you do in the playoffs, and trying to get to that state championship. Even though we wanted to get revenge and play them again, it was more about getting the state championship. That’s where our mind was.”
The long-awaited rematch was put on hold, however, as a stormy front flooded out the Friday night matchup, which was slated to be played at a neutral site at Highland High School.
“It was pretty crazy because it was raining for like two days straight, but we still had our assembly and everything,” Hamilton linebacker Santana Sterling recalled. “It came to be about one to two o’clock and the AIA called the game off. We would always have a walkthrough at the end of the day, and our coaches called us in and told us that the game would be moved to a Monday. It was just a crazy feeling because you’re hyped up for it all week, you finally match up against the team you wanted to match up with in the state semifinals. One winner goes to the state championship, and the other just has to stay and watch. The emotions were definitely high, people were intense, and it was weird just waiting those two days and waiting the whole weekend. We had to wait Friday, Saturday, Sunday and then go to school Monday having a weird feeling of having to play that game on a Monday night.”
Added Hamilton running back Tyrell Smith: “I’m definitely not used to playing on a Monday. Monday is usually just like your groggy day, but the stakes were so high so it kind of like kept you alive for that time period. We knew we were going to play Chandler. There was no room for letup even with that little weekend when we couldn’t play. We still came in for film on Saturday and stuff, so nothing could really change. It just felt a little different playing on a Monday night. It felt like the NFL with some ‘Monday Night Football.’”
Even when the two teams finally hit the field that Monday night, they sensed a different feeling.
“It felt weird, honestly,” Chandler offensive lineman Keola Daniels said. “A lot of us, it didn’t feel like we were in it. Especially with it raining, the fields were all muddy and I think it was just as difficult mentally. It wasn’t anything physically, because physically we knew that we could stand up to those guys because we did it before, but really all of our mentality just, something changed. It just didn’t feel right.”
The conditions remained rough at Highland High School, with midfield essentially turning into a mud pit by the end of the game. It was old-school football, even if it meant the conditions bordered on unplayable.
“On that field, I couldn’t even run,” Chandler receiver Dionte Sykes said. “I couldn’t even come out of a break. I couldn’t break down for a hitch route. I don’t know how Hamilton was functioning as an offense. Well, I do because of their power offense. I don’t know if it was just me, but it felt like I was on skates playing in the mud out there. Literally, I felt helpless. I was questioning what I was supposed to do and how I was supposed to make the best of this situation. How am I supposed to score? What am I going to do?”
Added Sterling: “It was a football game, a real football game. I don’t think there was any grass left on the field after the game. I remember there was just this giant mud pit. It was about more than just who won. It was about who was going to come out and face adversity and figure out a fix and just get through it. I definitely remember slipping all over the field trying to make a cut. You’d break back under a pulling guard and just completely slip a few times just being caught up in the mud.”
Added Smith: “I slipped once or twice in the game but we were definitely preparing to play on a sludgy field all week. We all knew it was going to impact [the game], so we even wet up our field a little bit just so we could get the feel of the sloppy ground and loose grass and stuff. We were prepared going into what we did, but it was even messier than I had expected, that’s for sure. I remember after, my jersey was completely brown, but I didn’t have much trouble planting so it kind of worked out in my favor.”
Again, defense ruled the evening between the two programs, with both teams unable to do much after first-quarter scoring drives. Hamilton took the edge into the fourth quarter up 14–10, and again seemed to have the defensive momentum to hold on late.
Chandler finally managed to move the ball, heading into the red zone before deciding to turn to the man who made the game-winning catch in the last matchup in Dionte Sykes.
“[Aguano] came to me — we practiced on the Saturday before the game at Campo Verde — and he came to me and asked me if I had ever played running back in my [Chandler Youth Football] days,” Sykes said. “I told him yes, of course. He asked me if I could take a handoff and I said of course. Those instincts don’t go away. He said that I was going to play running back, and we practiced it maybe twice that day and that was it. He said that when I call you, you have to be ready and that was it. We were on the goal line, we called ‘Wing’ and he told me to go in and I just dove over the goal line.”
Of course, his moment of elation was not without consequence. Sykes was flagged for excessive celebration, something he still questions to this day.
“I’ve done that after every single touchdown I’ve scored throughout my high school career,” he recalled. “For it to be called in that one specific game against Hamilton in the most important game of my high school career is beyond me. I know you guys have seen me do it before, and for it to be called in that game, in that situation. I think there was definitely a bias, or, I don’t really know. I should really keep my words to myself on that one. It’s just ironic that I got called for that in that situation, because I did it all year in every game.”
The flag forced a short kickoff for Chandler, who gave Hamilton the ball at around the 50-yard line, down 17–14 with just over a minute remaining. When Chandler’s defense took the field, Hamilton offensive coordinator Deke Schutes noted a wrinkle and sought to take advantage.
“I had noticed that they had run their nickel package out there so they had extra [defensive backs] in there and thinking that we were just going to throw the ball,” Schutes said. “We had two timeouts, so I said no and I put our two-tight end set in and we just ran — we had Casey Tucker at the time, who starts at Stanford right now at tackle, and he had just come back because he couldn’t play the first time we played them. He had just come back about two games before because he had had an ankle injury. Tyrell [Smith] was a really good deer back, which is between a running back and a fullback type, and they had that nickel [package] in there and we had base.
“I told our quarterback, Sam [Sasso], that we were just going to run option until they get out of this and put extra linemen in there so if we have to throw, at least we’ll have linebackers in there instead of their secondary. So we bust off a couple 10-yard runs, and we ran a kind of hurry-up where the quarterback will look at me and we’ll run the same exact play over but it’s like you hurry back on the line to run it. We noticed that they were starting to run their nickel off and get their extra [defensive backs] out, then we hurried up again and ran the play over and then our quarterback kept it and got like a 20-yard gain because they were trying to run more d-linemen on and take [defensive backs] out. So then they had to waste a timeout and regroup, but by that time we were already down to their 8-yard line and had all the momentum. We only ran two more plays to get to the 1-yard line, but most people don’t realize this. Everyone says it was fourth down, but it was only fourth down at the 1-yard line where we only needed inches to get a first down. We didn’t have to score to get a first down. We didn’t call a timeout. We just waited and watched the clock go, and then called timeout and they weren’t really paying attention. We were thinking, don’t call timeout yet and let this clock get down so then they finally called the timeout. We figured we were going to score, but we didn’t want them to have too much time. When the kids came to the sideline, they said we had to run that same play again because there was no way that they could stop this. I thought, since we only had to get two inches for a first down and then a touchdown, if we don’t score here and get a first down, then we had to clock or just spike the ball because we didn’t have any timeouts at that point. They already knew what to do, because with 22 seconds even if we didn’t score we would probably have a first down and then we’d clock it. We were fortunate enough to have Tyrell [Smith] running behind Casey Tucker and he really moved the pile for us to get that touchdown.”
For Smith and Sasso, the unintentional goats of the regular-season matchup, it was redemption. Smith, who had fumbled to open the door for Chandler’s comeback, led the charge and crossed the goal line on fourth down with a strong second effort. Smith said he wasn’t thinking of the play at all, instead focusing on getting his team to the state title game.
“It was huge for me,” Smith said. “Every time I’m inside the 10-yard line or something like that in the red zone, near the goal line, I’m trying to get in there. I knew it was fourth and one, and I knew I was about to be in that end zone and winning that game for us. I had to put on for the team. Coach Belles called my number, and that was a wrap.”
Added Sasso: “I think that was a great way to cap off that game with just a Tyrell being our go-to back and just our workhorse. Him carrying the ball and then punching it in, I think that was the icing on the cake for him.”
The win sent Hamilton to the state championship, where they would fall to Mountain Pointe. It also hardened the Chandler program, and set them up in the latest chapter of their growth.
“That loss, specifically, I think changed coach Aguano because I don’t think he wanted to experience that, ever,” Sykes said. “Especially losing to Hamilton in the third round of the playoffs.”
Added Daniels: “The whole culture at Chandler had changed [by 2014], in my opinion. All of our mentality was different than the year before. We all had this determination at the time that we were going to win a state championship, and that year, our seniors had to take charge.”
The Wolves did just that, dominating their early schedule (including a win over Colorado powerhouse Valor Christian) to roll into Hamilton at 4–1, The Huskies, who were 5–0 entering the game, had not lost at home in their last 64 games dating back to October 2004.
The streak, just like the 17-game streak that came to an end the year before, was eviscerated by Bryce Perkins and the Chandler Wolves. The Chandler quarterback put together one of the best performances of his high school career, completing 24 of 29 passes for 407 yards and six touchdowns in a 56–24 blowout win.
“Obviously that year, nobody expected to have a score like that over at their place in 2014,” Chandler offensive coordinator Rick Garretson said. “I think sometimes things just kind of happen… Things just kind of happened, and you knew things weren’t going to be like that in the second game. There was no way, because it’s too good of staff, too good of players and it’s going to be limited possessions, which is was that night. You’re going to have to make things stick. I know from a confidence perspective, it’s like you think you’ve got things pretty much well in line to make things happen, but you always know guys are going to make adjustments.”
Hamilton did make adjustments the next time the two teams would face each other, this time coming in the state championship game. It was the Wolves’ first-ever state championship game appearance, and marked the first time in the modern era that two programs so close in proximity had squared off for the golden ball.
The Huskies remained close by burning the clock and drowning out possessions, but couldn’t keep up with the Wolves as a Brandon Krcilek touchdown marked the only points Hamilton would score in a 28–7 loss.
In 2015, the rivalry would return to its same luster, a game Garretson described as a “barn burner.” Chandler would again win, 27–20, with a big grab from a barely-used receiver in Taj DeCarriere setting up the game-winning score at Austin Field.
“I mean, we’ve got Taj DeCarriere who makes a play with four minutes left in the game that you wouldn’t expect,” Garretson said. “It’s not like we were going yard on that thing or anything. That was a snag route that he caught and he took it 90-some odd yards. Then you’ve got Kyeler [Burke] open on a really nice call by Steve [Belles] and we got Parker Henley to track it and he knocks it down. Next thing you know, you wind up winning the game and it’s all over. That’s a really hard-fought battle and hard-fought game. That night, with the [blowout in 2014], that was just something that doesn’t really come along too often. Ultimately, you know year in and year out that you’re going to have to beat them in order to get to where you want to get to in regards to winning a state title. Generally, that’s going to come in the playoffs.”
Chandler once again romped at Hamilton’s Jerry Loper field in 2016, becoming the first-ever school to score more than 60 points on Hamilton in a 63–28 win that saw running back T.J. Green run for more than 300 yards and four touchdowns.
Entering the 2016 postseason, the rivalry standings still stand overwhelmingly in favor of Hamilton. The Huskies lead the all-time series 18–5, and while Chandler may have the current upper hand they still have a way to go to match Hamilton’s level of dominance.
Of course, it’s just another step in writing the history of the rivalry.
