North Thurston sophomore running back Toa Tunai capped off a brilliant day with a walk-off touchdown run to beat River Ridge 20-14 in double overtime Friday, Oct. 23 in a game that lasted nearly three hours.
Tunai finished with three rushing touchdowns and 210 yards on 31 carries to will North Thurston to its second win of the season. He struck first in the second quarter with a 3-yard score, and despite some explosive plays by both teams, no one scored again until 30 seconds into the fourth quarter.
On fourth-and-19, River Ridge quarterback Ryzen Nunez turned nothing into something with a dart to the back of the end zone to Caleb Marquez, who caught the ball over a defender to tie the game. The dazzling play made up for a wide-open dropped touchdown by the Hawks earlier in the game.
Neither offense could string together first downs in the fourth quarter, and the Rams came up with three clutch sacks in the final two minutes, including two by Grant Cook, to send the game to overtime.
With the drive starting at the Hawks’ 25-yard line, Tunai took over, needing just two carries to dive into the end zone and give the Rams a 14-7 lead. After River Ridge’s drive began with a holding penalty, Nunez tossed a short pass to D’Vaughntae Sellman, who made multiple defenders miss for the game-tying 35-yard touchdown.
The successful extra-point attempt kept the game going into a second overtime. River Ridge started with the ball in the second overtime, and a key sack by Mateo Henry put the Hawks behind the chains. North Thurston stopped a Nunez run on fourth down to hand the ball back to the defense, needing a score to win.
Tunai had the ball in his hands for the entirety of the drive, and he took a 7-yard toss to the house for the walk-off score.
“The kids deserved it. They played hard. They finally pieced the whole game together,” North Thurston head coach Deon Toliver said. “Toa, that dude just wanted to win. He didn’t want to lose to River Ridge. He played hard the whole game. He never came out of the game. They stacked the line, and he still broke tackle after tackle after tackle.”
Tunai added two sacks and two tackles for loss on defense.
North Thurston (2-6, 1-4 Puget Sound League) will visit Central Kitsap (2-6, 1-4 PSL) in a crossover on Thursday, Oct. 29. River Ridge (0-8, 0-5 PSL) will likely visit Bellarmine (1-7, 0-5 PSL) in a crossover that same night.
