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PITTSBURG — It was four and a half weeks ago that Clayton Valley Charter running back Omari Taylor stood on the sidelines at De La Salle, tears streaming down his face as he tried to talk about his older brother, who had been shot and killed a day earlier for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The pain of losing his brother Omar, one of five murder victims on Halloween night in Orinda, will never go away. But Taylor and his family are doing the best they can to move on with their lives.
That includes Taylor playing football for the Ugly Eagles. The junior turned in a splendid performance Saturday night, rushing for 152 yards and two scores, plus catching a touchdown pass as Clayton Valley beat Campolindo 27-7 to capture the North Coast Section Division II title at Pittsburg High.
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Taylor gave himself a “cool eight” for his effort against Campolindo.
“There’s always room for improvement,” he said.
Clayton Valley coach Tim Murphy had much more to say about Taylor.
“Omari has stepped up so well,” Murphy said. “It shows that if something goes negative, there’s always a way to find a positive. Omari did that in two ways, one on the field and one with his life. There’s no greater tragedy than that kid went through. To show the class and character that kid had. He’s never missed a class. He’s never missed a practice.”
That doesn’t mean Taylor is immune from being yelled at when the Uglies are playing ugly. The game was tied 7-7 at the half, mostly because Clayton Valley lost three fumbles. The first turnover led to Campolindo’s only touchdown, a 1-yard run by Will Windatt that tied the game at 7-7.
Clayton Valley (8-5), which will learn on Sunday whom it will play in the NorCal reginals next weekend, had taken a 7-0 lead on its opening possession, a 69-yard march in 16 plays that was capped by Taylor’s 8-yard run.
From there Clayton Valley fumbled on three of its next four possessions. Two of the loose balls were recovered by Campo linebacker Charlie Craig.
“Yeah, we had a little trouble,” Taylor said of holding on to the football. “Those were mental mistakes. Every team goes through it, but we came back strong.”
Clayton Valley scored twice in the third quarter. The first touchdown was quarterback Jake Kern’s 10-yard pass to Taylor. The Eagles made it 21-7 late in the third quarter when Kern ran in from the 4.
Taylor put the game out of reach with his 54-yard run midway through the fourth quarter.
“We were sloppy in the first half,” Murphy said. “But they did a good job of pulling the ball out from our players. Fortunately, our defense was impressive, especially against Harper.”
Clayton Valley held Campo quarterback Grant Harper to 13 completions in 27 attempts for 84 yards. The Cougars (10-3) had only 112 yards of total offense compared to 363 yards for Clayton Valley. In addition to Taylor’s big night, Rayshawn Jackson had 101 yards on the ground for the Uglies.
This was a game that had lots of potential for tension.
Campolindo played a major role in getting Clayton Valley relocated from the Diablo Athletic League to the tougher East Bay Athletic League in the off-season. The public schools in the DAL felt Clayton Valley was too strong and physical to be in a league with a charter school and a wider attendance area to draw from.
CVC wasn’t against moving but wanted to wait until after this season because schedules already had been arranged.
Murphy, who had to scramble to fill his non-league schedule and didn’t get it done until shortly before the season, called Clayton Valley’s victory Saturday night “poetic justice.”
“We couldn’t have waited one more year,” Murphy said. “Everyone’s schedule gets changed. To me the poetic justice is we faced them in a more important game than in the league they tried to get us out of.”
Campo coach Kevin Macy wasn’t backing down in his view about Clayton Valley Charter being too physical and strong.
“It’s like an SEC team playing an Ivy League team,” Macy said. “There’s a massive disparity. They’re just too big. Our kids fight hard, but they can only do so much.”
Other than the comments after the game, the night was relatively peaceful.
When Campolindo took the field for pregame warmups, the players took a lap including jogging on Clayton Valley’s sideline. But the Eagles were already on the field warming up and paid little attention to what Campo was doing.
Once the game started, it was clear Clayton Valley was the better team. Once the Eagles figured out how to hold on to the ball, it was reflected in the scoreboard.
