Palmetto tops Homestead in OT to win back-to-back GMAC flag football championships

Together they huddled up when the game was over and screamed “who’s got your back, I’ve got your back.”

Indeed, the Palmetto girls flag football team, the defending Class 2A state champions “had each other’s back” on Friday night.

Looking to repeat as GMAC champions, they overcame a Homestead touchdown in the final seconds that sent the game to overtime and emerged with a thrilling 12-6 overtime victory over the Broncos in the GMAC championship game at Traz Powell Stadium.

Just like she did a year ago when she led her team to that state title, the first for a Miami-Dade County team in flag football, it was quarterback Ava Alvarez who was the catalyst and had everybody’s back.

After the Palmetto defense stopped Homestead on its first overtime possession, it was Alvarez, on a third and goal from the Homestead six, who got loose in the open field and then sprinted and dove to the corner pylon before Bronco defenders could get her flag for the game-winning score.

“The play is designed specifically to see where the linebackers go,” said Alvarez of the winning score. “If they come down and shoot at me, I’ve got another person next to me that can run it in but they kept backing up into the end zone so I was like ‘you know what, I have a little gap, let me just run to it and I got there. What a feeling to find that end zone. I got chills thinking about winning back-to-back GMACs, especially my senior year.”

The win avenged one of Palmetto’s two regular season losses after Homestead knocked them off 19-13 a month ago on a touchdown in the waning seconds.

It looked like it might happen again on Friday night.

Just when it looked like Alvarez’s four yard touchdown run on the first play of the second quarter giving the Panthers a 6-0 lead just might hold up. They spent most of the remainder of the game moving the ball down the field but not being able to finish off drives with points.

But thanks to great defense, led by rusher Daniela Canals, the Broncos (9-4) were unable to find the end zone.

That was until Homestead’s final desperation drive when quarterback Jerniyah Fowles, thanks to a pair of fourth down conversions, led her team down the field. With just over a minute left and her team out of timeouts, Fowles needed one last fourth down conversion.

From the seven, she dropped back, scrambled to her left and tossed a pass into the corner of the end zone for Caitylyn Gibson. Despite being draped by three Palmetto defenders, Gibson leaped high and came down with the ball to tie the game.

An extra point (the ball is placed at the 3 yard line) would’ve won it for the Broncos, but Canals, as she had already done three times during the game, broke through and dove for Fowles’ flag, sacking her and sending the game to OT.

“It’s all about defense and chemistry,” said Canals, who transferred from Coral Reef last year and thus was enjoying her first GMAC title. “Like our chant said, we’ve got each other’s backs. When something bad goes down, it’s on all of us and up to us to have each other’s backs and keep fighting. Even when the game went to overtime, we had faith that we would make the plays to win it and we did.”

Alvarez was also the big player a few hours earlier in a semifinal win when she scored a pair of touchdowns and threw for another as the No. 3 seeded Panthers (10-2) mowed down No. 2 Ferguson 32-6 which avenged their other regular season loss. Homestead (9-4) actually came in as the No. 4 seed but scored an impressive 26-6 win over top-seeded Edison in the first semifinal.

“Our girls, we’ve gone through a little bit of adversity with two close losses during the season so it feels great to see what they did out there today,” said Palmetto head coach Kevin Mujica who will now set off to try and defend his team’s 2A title in Class 4A with the state having now expanded flag to four classifications. “They knew there was a lot going into this game and were ready for the challenge. Homestead is a very athletic well-coached team and we knew it would take everything we had to get this done, especially after losing to them in the final seconds last month.”

Asked about his star senior quarterback, Mujica didn’t hesitate to start gushing.

“Ava Alvarez is probably the best flag quarterback in the state and will continue to be an underdog in that category,” he said. “A girl who knows the game very well, constantly coming up to me to tell me to trust her, that we’re going to do this or that, and she was our leader out there today.”