Mesa headed for playoffs

COSTA MESA — Senior tight end Rafael Hernandez grabbed the big bucket of ice water after the game, running it onto the field.

Its destination? The head of Costa Mesa High Coach Jeremy Osso.

The celebratory water dump was done with such emphasis that the bucket hit Osso on the side of his head, and the coach was still rubbing his temple minutes later.

A lot of hurt this year for the Mustangs, too, but many reasons to celebrate after Costa Mesa shut out Calvary Chapel, 8-0, in both teams’ Orange Coast League and regular-season finale Thursday night at Orange Coast College.

The main reason for celebration is that Costa Mesa’s season lives on, because the Mustangs (3-7, 2-1 in league) clinched their first playoff berth since 2002 with the win. Costa Mesa, the No. 2 playoff entry out of the league, will find out Sunday its opponent in the first round of the CIF Southern Section Southern Division playoffs.

And the Mustangs, especially the senior class which had never experienced the playoffs, were well aware of the five-year gap.

“Coach kept reminding us every day,” said senior running back-free safety John Salyer, who carried 13 times for a team-best 63 yards against Calvary. “It means a lot. It’s something for this program. We’ve been losing constantly, different coaches. All the distractions we’ve had this year, and for us to make it to the playoffs? It’s great for the team.”

Salyer, fellow senior Cody De La Mater and junior Robbie Gemayel shared ball-handling duties and combined for 175 yards, with junior Antwon Byrd out with an elbow contusion. All three players had more than 50 yards rushing.

“All three of us brought different things to the table, and coach kept rotating us in so we wouldn’t get tired,” Salyer said.

It was Gemayel who produced the only score of the game, carrying it in from five yards out with three minutes, six seconds left in the third quarter. Mesa faked the conversion kick and Salyer passed to Gemayel, giving the Mustangs an 8-0 lead.

Every subsequent drive for Calvary Chapel (1-9, 1-2) produced nothing.

First, Brian Waldron picked off a pass late in the third quarter, after Salyer had batted the ball away from the receiver.

Then, Gemayel recovered a fumble at the Costa Mesa 27-yard line early in the fourth quarter.

The next two Eagles drives ended in a turnover on downs, the latter when Mahlow’s pass on fourth-and-nine was incomplete under pressure from Mesa defensive end Thomas Guzowski.

That gave Costa Mesa the ball back at the Calvary 26 with 1:45 to go, but an eventual botched field-goal attempt gave Calvary one more chance with 55 seconds left.

It went for naught, though, as Gemayel intercepted a ball over the middle on the next play to preserve Costa Mesa’s big win.

“The defense was amazing,” Osso said. “Robbie came to play tonight. He was all over the place ... Last week our defense maybe didn’t come hard [in a 41-13 loss to Estancia], but we were coming hard this week. Not letting [Calvary running back Brandon Snook] run loose, that helped.”

Snook finished with 104 yards, but had only two carries of more than 10 yards.

After the game, De La Mater searched for words to describe the win, although the first word he produced to describe how he felt was “sore.”

“This feels awesome,” De La Mater said. “I’ve never had this feeling before. Going to the playoffs senior year, I thought it’d never happen. Just always wanting it and now it finally happened, it’s just so sweet. So sweet. It meant a lot.”

Then, De La Mater finally found the adjective he was looking for.

“It feels delicious,” he said.

MATT SZABO may be reached at (714) 966-4614 or by e-mail at matthew.szabo@latimes.com.