Jeff Harbison pointed to the scoreboard hanging over the crowd at Daniel Teicheira Memorial Stadium, inviting everyone to take one last look.

In a season full of runaway victories and running clocks, a gripping, down-to-the-wire escape job never felt so fulfilling.

Wide receiver Hunter Johnson lived up to his nickname – Mr. Fantastic – willing the Timberwolves to the go-ahead touchdown with 6:29 left in the game, and then a defense full of maulers and brawlers showed its fangs once more, stuffing a two-time defending state champion during winning time.

That final peek at the scoreboard: Sierra 17, Central Catholic 14.

The score won’t soon be forgotten, even as Sierra begins preparation for next week’s tilt at Lathrop with film today.

Beating Central Catholic moves the barometer – and even a calculated and controlled coach like Harbison can’t deny that.

“This is one of the best wins in Sierra High history – 20 years,” Harbison said in the postgame huddle, just loud enough for hundreds to hear. “Let me ask you – are we done? This is only one game.  Do not rest on this victory.”

But where does it fall?

“It’s got to be top-3 ... up there with our big game against Oakdale (2009) and Sonora last year,” Harbison later expounded. “This is something special. To beat a parochial school, a school with no boundaries, is something special. Sierra did this – with Sierra students.”

Yes, it was a night of revelations … for those not privy to inner workings of this football program.

For the first time all season, the Timberwolves were pushed to the brink, forced to roll up their sleeves and enter a fight it wasn’t promised to win.

For a month now, Sierra’s opponents have wilted and disappeared before the fourth quarter.

Central Catholic wouldn’t go away that easy, even if it was outmanned and out-talented – and that wasn’t the case Friday evening.

The Raiders began the fourth quarter with a 14-10 lead thanks to a Superman dive by Jared Rice from the 1-yard line late in the third quarter.

And even after Hunter Johnson’s circus catch vaulted Sierra into the lead, 17-14, Central Catholic still had six-plus minutes to engineer a game-winning drive.

Sierra understood the stakes and the challenge. Its response was classic “me against the world.” If no one thinks we can hang on for victory, Johnson said, we’ll circle the wagons, play for those who believe in blue and show ‘em all.

“Everybody doubted us and we came together and got it done,” Johnson added. “We never had a doubt. We kept fighting; kept giving 100 percent.”

There were heroes and crucial plays all over the field on Friday night.

For all of his efforts on the Timberwolves’ final drive, Johnson couldn’t score that touchdown alone. He needed a quarterback to put the pigskin in tight spaces. So credit first-year quarterback Devin Nunez, whose ball might have lacked zip but was never wanting for accuracy.

He was 3 of 4 on that eventual game-winning drive.

The Timberwolves defense turned the pocket into a mosh pit at a rock concert, collapsing the space around Hunter Petlansky. The burly quarterback did well to avoid many of the arms and legs and bodies flying in his direction, but how many one-foot, on-the-run throws did the Raiders expect to him to complete?

During one stretch, Petlansky misfired on six consecutive passes and his next completion moved the stick … backwards.

“We just want to throw all 11 hats at the ball on every play,” linebacker Trevon McCray said. “We like to get physical. We punched them in the mouth before they could punch us, and I think they got scared.”

But if you want to know the real reason the Timberwolves finished the night with chest bumps and high-fives, you’ll have to rewind the tape.

All the way back to Thursday evening.

There are 55 reasons why Sierra won Friday’s game. Those reasons are pinned to the wall in the locker room, paper promises from the coaches to the players, the players to each other, and the players to themselves.

On Thursday evening, the Sierra varsity football team gathered on campus for its team dinner. Eventually, the plates and silverware were swapped for pen and paper, and every member of the team was tasked with bearing their soul.

Players promised to make tackles. To make catches, blocks and plays when their number was called. To cheer and call out plays and constantly be in the moment … even if their moment never included a live snap.

As the season unfolds, the act of putting promises to paper and then tacking them up on the locker room wall may be Harbison’s smartest coaching move, week in and week out. It keeps his team humble, hungry and accountable.

“We made promises to each other that we would do what we had to do to win this game,” McCray said. “My promise was that I would make tackles.”

He made plenty, including a pad-crackling stop on a screen pass to running back Jared Rice that sent a shiver through the stadium.

“They made promises and we pinned them up in the locker room. We challenged them to stick to it,” Harbison said. “… Everybody contributed to this victory.”

And for that reason alone, it was worth one last look on Friday night.