SAN LEANDRO — All night, Greg Haubner drew up plays to get the ball to his star wide receiver. Nothing was working.

Foothill was knotted in a scoreless tie against San Leandro at halftime and traded touchdowns early in the second half. The meeting of a pair of programs on the rise was a knock-down, drag-out affair that appeared to have no end in sight.

Then, Max Shuga declared ball.

“Two words: That’s mine,” the junior receiver said after he leaped over his defender, hauled in a 21-yard gain from junior quarterback Gavin Brown and set up the decisive score with less than 2 minutes to go in Foothill’s eventual 14-7 win.

“After that, it’s like, you know we’re winning this game,” Haubner, in his eighth season coaching the Falcons (3-1), said. “That’s got to be an all-timer, one that I’ll never forget as long as I coach. You can’t make that play and lose.”

The catch, on fourth and 4, put Foothill on San Leandro’s 5-yard line, and junior running back Amaree Hill powered in his second score of the evening on the next play. Still, things weren’t so certain.

Foothill began its previous drive in the red zone courtesy of a botched punt and faced a fourth-and-1 situation from the 6-yard line. Rather than call on his reliable kicker for a chip shot that would have put Foothill in front, Haubner dialed up a run for Hill, who was stuffed, and the Falcons gave the ball back to San Leandro.

After the touchdown, the Pirates (3-1) got the ball back with 1:34 remaining and threatened to send it to overtime. Sophomore quarterback Devin Martinez led them across midfield, but their final drive fell victim to the same enemy that ended the two before it.

Jayce Cardera, a senior safety, wrapped up Martinez 10 yards behind the line of scrimmage on third and 9, and the Pirates couldn’t overcome the fourth-and-long situation. Cardera also tipped Martinez’s pass on third down of their previous drive, setting up the game-winning score, and sacked Martinez on third down to end the drive before that.

“The kid has continued to improve and make himself better,” Haubner said of Cardera. “He’s just one of those stories of high school football of a guy that’s an overachiever. That’s one of the reasons I coach, to coach kids like that.”

Seeking its first winning season since 2021, San Leandro began the year 3-0 behind the strength of its two-headed rushing attack but was forced to play without its top running back, Jaymieon Bradley, who was ruled out with a thigh bruise.

Foothill, which hasn’t finished above .500 since 2022, was also at less than full strength after its workhorse running back, Dylan Souza, left injured late in the first half. The senior carried the ball 10 times for 50 yards in the first half before he tweaked his hamstring that had bothered him to begin the season.

Hill stepped up with 38 yards on 12 carries — all in the second half — for the Falcons, who also got 152 yards passing from the two juniors who split snaps at quarterback, Brown (who played the second and fourth quarters) and Andrew Nelson (who played the first and third). Tack on another 22 yards for senior running back Osmar Calderon, who found Yohan Du for a long connection on a fake handoff that helped put them in position to score the game’s first touchdown, almost halfway through the third quarter.

“They did a lot of things to try to neutralize our speed and keep the ball out of our hands,” San Leandro coach Brad Bowers said. “They did a great job of it. We just couldn’t execute when we needed to. Couldn’t move the ball when we needed to. It just gave them more opportunities and more hope. When you give a team hope and let them stick around, they can take advantage of it.”

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Hope like the kind that manifests with the football and its intended target suspended in midair?

“Exactly, absolutely, yes,” Bowers said. “And it was a phenomenal catch.”

While Foothill took a blowout loss to Monte Vista in Week 1, the Falcons have reeled off three consecutive wins since. San Leandro had started the season 3-0, but Bowers suggested the early success got in his team’s head.

“I think we took that for granted a little bit and played down early in the game, didn’t play our brand of football,” he said. “Our defense is legit. There’s a lot of fire on the defensive side. We’re trying to find that same fire on the offensive side.”