Turnovers help Edison bulldoze Brackenridge

Brackenridge had several chances to get back in the game, take control of the game and remain in control of the District 28-5A race.

When key plays came around, though, Edison made them more often than not.

The Golden Bears flipped a turnover into a go-ahead score late in the first half and had two of their four interceptions in the fourth quarter, pulling away for a 31-17 win Oct. 1 in front of an estimated 2,100 fans at Alamo Stadium.

“Toward like the middle of the fourth quarter, that’s when we started making those plays,” Edison junior Brandon Olivares said. “The defense came though.”

The Golden Bears (4-1 overall, 2-1 28-5A), No. 7 in the Express-News sub-Class 6A rankings, moved into a fourth-place tie with Highlands in the nine-team district. The eighth-ranked Eagles (3-3, 3-1) suffered their first loss in league play, slipping into a second-place tie with Sam Houston.

Brackenridge got a game-high 146 rushing yards from senior Fred Jones, whose 34-yard touchdown run cut his team’s deficit to 24-17 late in the third quarter. The Eagles had three chances to tie after that, but punted, turned the ball over on downs and threw an interception in the end zone to Raymond Roshto.

Roshto had two of the four interceptions thrown by Brackenridge quarterback Vincent Gonzalez, who finished 8-of-24 passing for 108 yards and a second-quarter touchdown to James Hernandez. Andrew Lecea and Olivares had the other picks, with Olivares’ sealing the win in the waning minutes.

“They executed better than we did,” Jones said of the Eagles. “We didn’t play hard enough like we usually do.”

Edison quarterback Danny Cadena finished 14-of-25 passing for 230 yards and two touchdowns and also rushed for 49 yards and a score. He threw a 61-yard scoring strike to Taylor Ahoyt on the game’s first play from scrimmage, and later gave the Golden Bears a 17-10 lead with a 21-yard TD toss to Olivares with two seconds left in the opening half. Edison punted on the play before that, but Jason Gutierrez’s kick deflected off a Brackenridge player and was picked up by the Bears’ Wesley Amaro.

“I didn’t think it was a good call, but what can we say?” Brackenridge coach Willie Hall said. “He called it, and we have to live with it. We just have to get out of the half, and we didn’t.”

Edison doubled the lead to 24-10 early in the second half, forcing a three-and-out by Brackenridge and then marching 84 yards in 10 plays. Cadena scored on a 4-yard run on fourth down.

The Eagles made it a one-possession game with Jones’ long scoring run but couldn’t completely erase the deficit. Olivares’ 33-yard reception on third down helped set up a 23-yard TD run by Brian Mattison, which put the game away with less than three minutes left.

“At this point, it’s the team that makes the least mistakes,” Edison coach Albert Torres said. “I’m just very thankful our kids played the way they did, making the plays to come out on top.” adam.zuvanich@express-news.net Twitter: @AZuvanich