Juan Diego RB Ongoha Angana Vea scores on this short TD run to give Juan Diego a 21-7 lead during first half play. Juan Diego High School beat Wasatch 35-14 in the 3A semi-final game at Rice-Eccles Stadium, Thursday. (Scott Sommerdorf / The Salt Lake Tribune)
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For Juan Diego, the method to success isn't a hard one. It's also not hard to predict what the Soaring Eagle will run from play to play.

Indeed, when describing his offense, Cody Stevenson was almost eloquent in saying, "we just want to ram it down people's throats."

In Juan Diego's 35-14 win over Wasatch in Thursday's Class 3A semifinal at Rice-Eccles Stadium, the Soaring Eagle did just that lining up time and again and running the ball into the interior of the Wasps defense.

Unfortunately for Wasatch, it wasn't equipped to stop the team that's been unbeaten in Utah all season long and is the odds on favorite to repeat as state champs next Friday. The Wasps stayed competitive for the first half, trailing by

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3A semifinal football: Juan Diego vs. Wasatch
just 21-14 at halftime. But surely, much like novocaine from a dentist, Juan Diego took over and ran away with it down the stretch, scoring both of its clinching touchdowns in the fourth quarter.

"Wasatch isn't in the semifinals for being a bad football team," Soaring Eagles coach John Colosimo said. "That's a good team over there. They caught us off-guard a little bit in the first half and they had some success with what they were doing. We made some adjustments and we played well after halftime."

With the win, the Soaring Eagle will face the Hurricane-Park City winner when those two face off on Friday morning. And they did it by pounding the ball with Tana Vea, who dominated on the ground with 187 yards on 30 carries. He also scored three touchdowns and took over at defensive back when Utah State commit Keegan Andersen went down with a broken leg.

"Tana's going to be a pretty tired football player," Colosimo said. "He was great today."

The key for Juan Diego was in the halftime adjustments. Payton Davis, the Wasatch quarterback, had 178 total yards at halftime. So the Soaring Eagle, who were hurt in the first half with the underneath crossing route, shifted from man to man into a dime defense and spied Davis with a linebacker. The move limited Davis, who had 69 rushing yards in the first half, to 11 yards on the ground after halftime. He was also sacked three times and threw for just 49 yards in the second half.

"We knew that if we came out and just took things play by play that we should be fine," Stevenson said. "We wanted to come out and we wanted to take things play by play."

Andersen scored the first touchdown on a 36 yard pass from Stevenson early in the first quarter. On the very next possession, Trevor McFalls, a senior tight end, caught an 18 yard touchdown pass to hand Juan Diego a 14-0 advantage.

tjones@sltrib.com

Highlights

Tana Vea scores three touchdowns and runs for 187 yards.

» Defensive back Keegan Andersen suffers a broken leg and is out for the season. He is a Utah State commitment.

» Juan Diego advances to the Class 3A title game.