The article below originally appeared in the San Mateo Daily Journal and is being reprinted with permission.
CSM football is peaking as Northern California playoffs loom
The emergence of CSM running back Lolo Mataele, left, and quarterback Dom Ingrassia has helped the CSM offense go from 20 points per game in non-conference games, to 49 points through five Bay 6 Conference games. Photo by Patrick Nguyen.
The College of San Mateo’s throttling of Laney College 57-7 last Friday put the finishing touches on the Bulldogs’ third straight Bay 6 Conference title and set them up as the No. 1 seed in the Northern California playoffs, which begin Nov. 30.
At 9-1 on the regular season, there is a pretty sharp line of demarcation between the non-conference and conference portions of the schedules for the Bulldogs.
In the first five games of the season, all non-conference matchups against some of the best teams in Northern California, the Bulldogs were scoring an average of 20.2 points per game.
But in the five Bay 6 Conference game, that number exploded to 49 points per game. The difference? The CSM coaching staff settling on starting quarterback Dom Ingrassia.
It took several weeks to get to that conclusion, however.
“We had competition during training camp and we had our depth chart,” said CSM head coach Tim Tulloch. “Sometimes those things stay the way they are and sometimes those things change.”
And Ingrassia wasn’t necessarily on that depth chart as the CSM coaching staff had decided to grayshirt the freshman out of San Marin High School in Novato. That means he was taking reps at the back of the quarterback rotation because, as a grayshirt, Ingrassia would not be playing.
Three weeks into the season, the Bulldogs had started two different quarterbacks, were 2-1 in which two of those games — a 27-26 season-opening win over Sierra and a 23-20 loss to Modesto — were decided by four points. The coaching staff decided it needed to reevaluate the position, at which point they talked it over with Ingrassia about activating him.
“We are a competition-based program. We grade every rep of every practice at every position, including quarterback. We have open competition and sometimes it’s health and sometimes it’s performance (that necessitates a change),” Tulloch said. “(But) Mike Dovenberg (offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach) does a great job developing players and having them stay ready. … Once a guy earns a starting job, he has to continue to earn that every week.”
Ingrassia got the start in Week 4 against American River College and helped the Bulldogs eke out a 17-14 lead. It was more of the same in Week 5 against Fresno, a 14-7 CSM victory.
But Ingrassia was getting more and more comfortable. After a bye between the end of non-conference and the start of the Bay 6, Ingrassia and the CSM offense came out smoking. They tied a season high with 27 points in a win over Diablo Valley and then they really got rolling: 49 in a win over Foothill, hung half-a-hundred in a 51-7 win over rival San Francisco, scored a season-high 61 in a win over San Joaquin Delta and capped the regular season with 57 against Laney.
“Chemistry, that needs to be developed. All that stuff takes time,” Tulloch said. “For him, we were playing catch up. We’re not going to roll out our whole offense against ARC and Fresno. … The thing I’m most proud of was the staff did a great job of figuring out what he did really well and majoring that in the first game.”
It also helped that Ingrassia immediately had the respect of the rest of his teammates.
“[Ingrassia] is fearless. He is not fazed by anything and the team has built this great belief in him,” Tulloch said. “The guys love and they’ve rallied behind him.”
Naturally, Ingrassia hasn’t had to do it all by himself. Running back Lolo Mataele, a sophomore from East Palo Alto who graduated from Patterson High School in the Central Valley, emerged as a lead back this season, averaging 94 yards rushing per game in which he seldom played all four quarters because of lopsided scores. KB Boone-Nelson, a sophomore out of Rocklin High School, became Ingrassia’s favorite target. Although he averaged only three catches per game, he made the most of them, averaging 20 yards per catch.
The Bulldogs special teams have been just that, as well — special. Return man Hassan Mahasin has returned a kickoff and a punt for scores and is averaging nearly 35 yards on kick returns. Kicker Dieter Kelly has had a record-breaking year, with three of his 15 field goals being 50 yards or longer and has missed only four kicks all season — one PAT and three field goals.
Punter Tashi Drove is averaging 43 yards per punt.
The CSM defense has been on point all season. The Bulldogs allowed just 11.9 points for the season and that number dropped to 9.8 in five Bay 6 Conference games, where they gave up a total of 49 points. Photo by Patrick Nguyen.
It also helped Ingrassia’s development that the CSM defense has been on top of its game since Week 1. The Bulldogs’ defense has not allowed more than 26 points in any one game this season. The Bulldogs gave up an average of 11.2 points per game, but in Bay 6 play, that number dropped to paltry 9.8, allowing a total of 49 points combined in five conference games.
Defensive linemen Eza Funa (Mater Dei) and John Guyer (Notre Dame-Sherman Oaks) have combined for 85 tackles, while the secondary of Sherrod Smith (Menlo-Atherton), Kyle Hall (Rocklin) and Kalen Woods (Fremont-Oakland) have combined for 10 interceptions.
“[The defense is] starting to fire on all cylinders. You want a team to team to start peaking and this is the time we need to be firing on all cylinders,” Tulloch said. “Our conference play … they’re all battles. Even though some of the scores haven’t been one-score games, there is still a lot of intensity and emotion.
“It’s never felt easy.”
And Tulloch said that’s the mindset the Bulldogs need to adopt heading into the playoffs — that it’s not going to be easy.
“I’m never, ever satisfied,” Tulloch said. “We have not hit our potential yet. Our job is to see if we can do that in the next two weeks to see if we can get closer to being our best.
“We have to be better (for the playoffs) because the level of competition goes up each week, so we have to rise to that level.
“Our goal is to be our best Nov. 30 and hope that’s good enough to get a game in December. … If we don’t, we go home.”
