The Narbonne Gauchos have fielded stronger, deeper, more experienced teams in recent seasons.
Still, in 2017 they ventured out of state, all the way to the middle of the Pacific, to take on Hawaii powerhouse Saint Louis. The trek was worthwhile. The promise and potential they showed in four games, including losses to Long Beach Poly and Centennial, were fully on display at Aloha Stadium on Saturday night in an instant-classic, made-for-TV-but-wasn’t-on-TV 56-50 loss to Saint Louis.
Quarterback Jalen Chatman passed for 517 yards and five TDs. He also ran for another on a smooth rollout-quarterback draw type play. Running back Jermar Jefferson showed that he has prototype game, a hybrid running back/receiver who is a good fit in any system. Saint Louis limited him to 46 rushing yards on 17 carries — most of them came on an early 42-yard rip — but he was at his best running routes. Jefferson hauled in eight passes for 179 yards, including two touchdowns that were breathtaking, scintillating and crowd-silencing. It was the old Marshall Faulk effect on the UH Rainbow Warriors, sucking all the air out of the atmosphere at Aloha Stadium just when Saint Louis seemed to have jolted the place with offensive electricity.
The humidity at sea level in the islands seemed to have an effect on both defenses in the second half. Three touchdowns combined were scored in less than a minute when the fourth quarter began.
“The humidity wasn’t a factor. Our kids weren’t cramping,” longtime Gauchos coach Manuel Douglas said. “What’s happening, though, is we were scoring quickly and our defense was back on the field. But we don’t have any two-way players. We have been struggling offensively running the ball and a little bit of that showed up in crunch time.”
Douglas’ team had a 30-21 lead at halftime and opened the lead to 37-21 early in the third quarter, but a stonewalling Saint Louis run defense proved to be a difference-maker. Even as Jefferson wowed everyone watching with his blur-speed explosiveness.
“We had some success getting him the ball with some stuff we hadn’t run all year. When the back would sit and the linebacker would come, then we’d throw it. Melvin Davis, he’s a running back at Hawaii, when he was a big-time running back for us, we ran that for him in the Coliseum, and he scored three touchdowns,” Douglas said.
The good news for the Gauchos is that they racked up massive yardage and points while on the road against a formidable opponent. They begin CIF Marine League action next week with five games of elite-level experience behind them. Douglas sees his QB’s confidence rising through the adversity and challenges.
“We move forward. Like Long Beach Poly, we were close and lost 14-10 at the end. We could easily be 4-1. Tonight, Jalen made throws I’m used to him making, making good reads, not making mistakes. We maintained at the line of scrimmage. We made mistakes, but not as many,” Douglas said. “Saint Louis a good team. We challenge ourselves with our schedule. We came 3,000 miles and came up short a little bit.”
Way to rep the 808. Good job. Now back to hating. RR4L._.
The main stat matters. Hawaii Boys holds it down at home!
Stl4life
From the headline and tone of the article you’d think StL lost. Could have mentioned that StL scored 28 points in the 4th qtr and that Cordeiro threw for over 400 yard and 7 TDs. Biased MUCH/?!!
Hey Hawaii Prep, how about an article that says
“Crusaders offense carved up Narbonnes defense for the win”
Geez you guys do know STL scored MORE than Narbonne right? Despite all their athletes? GTFO
Nice job Crusaders!! Congrats!
Relax guys. They had to do a make up article for the negative one they wrote earlier about Narborne. You know the one about the kid getting beaten to death and the other kid getting stabbed. Heaven knows what would happen if they brought up the infamous Vegas trip or the teacher being chocked in her own classroom.
Why aren’t there any highlight videos like there normally are? This was one of the most exciting game that was never recorded.
@88: or the time Kahuku players spread feces all over the lockers at Aloha Stadium after a loss under Semones or the time Kahuku students stoned buses of opposing visiting teams after games at home field. Always classy on the Norh Shore!!
Talk about spreading feces…
Kahuku learned how to stone busses after they played games at Nanakuli and Kailua and those fans threw rocks at our buses, only then did Kahuku do the same. Know your facts!
Awrite lol!!! So Kahuku should definitely keep throwing rocks at buses then. It’s totally cool, they learned it from Nanakuli
@robocop…..LMAO, yep that’s the logic and mentality in that area. Hawaii’s equivalent of the country hicks from the movie “Deliverance”
Who said Kahuku still throws rocks? It happened decades ago.
However! one “monkey-see monkey-do” action that Kahuku still does is they learned to recruit from Cal Lee. oh, and throw in Kale Ane, York, Miano and D.Hernandez…they all learned to recruit from the king of recruiting.
As someone who played for St. Louis I can tell you for a fact there’s no recruiting. Why do you think these kids are so small? Wouldn’t you think they would recruit bigger and more talented kids? It’s all a myth and these kids are regular kids who’s parents put them in a good school from a younger age and obviously they go through int and jv football to vars. Come on guys with the recruiting. If anything you guys should be wondering why so many punahou transfers are magically going to Kahuku…
Dafun maybe you were not recruited but there are kids from our North Shore community that are and I am all for it.
..you mean why so many Laie Park football kids who transfered to Punahou are now transferring back to Kahuku?
You dont win state titles without talent and every top school needs to find a way to acquire that talent. Plain and simple.
Hey does the classic phrase “rooted not recruited” count if you moved from Tonga or Samoa here to play football for the red team?
Besides. St Louis is a private school, maybe you don’t know how it works. They don’t have a district. The school sits in Kaimuki’s district. So you see, it’s impossible for St Louis to have any “homegrown” players.
Plus all you guys crying about recruiting obviously don’t give a damn about the kids. They get to play for a team that gets them lots of media and college attention and get a private school, college prep education. I’m happy for them. I HOPE they get recruited and free scholarship. If that’s true then they get opportunities they wouldn’t have gotten otherwise.
Yup, the opportunity are greater at private schools, no one is arguing that. But you got to understand that all the familys that pay the ILH tuition expect titles, even if it means giving free scholarships to mercenary polynesians that will help their team win, cough!cough! Punahou. Of course STL alumni and Cal Lee cant stand the fact of 2nd place, thats why he never accepted his 2nd place trophy in 2015.
STL is a win at all cost program, they cannot stand the fact of a lowly Kahuku public school beating them, thats why they will recruit the outer islands, change state tourney classifications, bring Cal lee and June jones on campus etc….Looks like you guys the ones more desperate about winning.
BTW….I know one family in Mililani whose kids started at STL. I asked why they chose to go to STL when Mililani has a power house team. They said the chances of winning a state title is better at STL with other talented kids, The chances of Millilani getting past Kahuku is slim.
Hey man no one is calling Kahuku a “lowly public school” Kahuku is historically the favorite for the state title most years.
Giving scholarships to “mercenary Polynesians” how does this not benefit those kids? Similar to college, your athletic ability can get you better opportunities. Good for them! Some may come from areas or families that present high risks of introducing those kids to drugs and gang violence. But instead they focus on sports and go to a school that will Prep you for college. Also a school that is probably away from the neighborhood gangsters.
Your comment about “you guys desperate to win” if you were to hire someone for a job, wouldn’t you want someone that is driven to succeed at all costs? That’s who I would hire to coach my football team. Don’t make like winning isn’t huge for Every other school also. If Kahuku turned into a bottom level football school, how many Utah, Samoa, Tonga, etc kids would be transferring to Kahuku? They go because it’s a power program that’s nationally recognized. Don’t act like you guys don’t want to win just as bad. You just don’t scholarships to give out. If you did you would.
What players from tonga samoa or new Zealand play for Kahuku. Also the circle island bus don’t go there. So do they eat and sleep in Kahuku district?
The locker room damage by Scott Chan of the stadium was not as bad as made up to be. He just didn’t like Kahuku not rolling over StL like Waianae was during the run. That and the ILH pay the Stadium the most money. So they kiss up to ILH like HHSAA kiss up.
Why does Cal Lee never submits a full roster to HPW or Scoring live. Name numbers with no weight and height. One of his tricks? He’s the only coach that does that. Even on Narbonne Max prep they have that info. Why was the dB burned all night? Because they lightweight lbs trying to act like dbs. As one poster commented that STL don’t recruit, how does the housing kids from halawa or kali hi get tuition money??
Coach C- its called financial aid. Last time I checked that kid from kalihi is a 4.0 student and has offers from all the top academic schools.
You guys talking about recruiting. No one on that starting offense was recruited. That’s a bunch of kids who went there since intermediate and worked there butts of to get where they are at. There’s only one returnee in the skilled position and the rest were 2nd and 3rd stiringers. Like I said it’s not recruiting it’s called HARD WORK!
Robo you hit the nail square on the head, atleast you admitting to the ILH doing anything and everything to win and beat the competition. Thats fine and dandy if you planning on taking your act to the mainland and flex your muscle against similar recruiting competition. But no STL like stay in their own little pond and beat down on the very public schools that they steal their players from.
The biggest mistake the Lee politicians made was to cry when they lost to Kahuku in 2015, instead of owning up to the loss Cal went on camera and made the excuse…”it would be nice to play Kahuku in the regular season so we can get used to their smash mouth style”. Sure enough a few months later the ILH proposes to the OIA to combine leagues and offers the OIA 3 Million$$$, OIA says no! so they secretly create the Open division format and insert their 2nd ILH team.
In 2016 after they beat Kahuku Ron Lee is saying “the competition in the OIA is weaker and we knew it would come back to bite them…we dont have a soft schedule we play Punahou and Kam so we were prepared for them”.
So when Kahuku wins things need to change? But when an ILH team wins everything in the universe is fine? Where money and peoples jobs are involved in the private school sector, politics and unethical behaviour is sure to follow, as long as its the public schools that are suffering its ok.
What is the negative impact of students attending private school?
awrite- like after St. Louis won this past year they when change the format. I wonder why?