Yuma Catholic football playoff preview

Shamrocks primed for another run at the state title

YUMA, Ariz., (KYMA, KECY) - Yuma Catholic football is setting out to complete it's latest state championship pursuit.

The Shamrocks have positioned themselves with an inside track to a potential 3A state semifinal birth thanks to reaching the 4th overall seed.

They accomplished this by narrowly defeating River Valley on the road two weeks ago.

This guarantees Y.C. home games in the 1st 2 rounds of the playoffs, if they win the opening postseason game this Friday night.

Looking ahead at their 1st round opponent, Rocks head coach Rhett Stallworth assesses the Payson Longhorns from both sides of the football.

"They got a really tough running back and they want to feed him the football and see how he does. At the end of the day, they're not used to throwing the ball very much so they definitely want to establish the run. And, you know, we hope that we can just get out there and take that away from them and force them to throw the football. As far as defensively, I'm sure we'll see some new things each week. We tend to see new things from people and what they're drawing up to stop our passing attack."

Rhett Stallworth - Yuma Catholic Head Football Coach

The Shamrocks are still not completely healthy.

They're hopeful for some of their key position players to be back at full strength soon.

Among them are Jackson Jones and Kofa transfer Zach Castaneda.

Yuma Catholics 3A 1st round playoff game kicks off at Ricky Gwynn Stadium at Yuma Catholic High School this Friday night with the opening kick-off at 7.