He wasn’t on the winning side. He didn’t throw or run for a touchdown. His individual statistics weren’t super.

But Sean Ryan, Vintage High School’s second-year starting quarterback, still played one of the best overall games of his life in Big Game XXXVII Friday night in a 24-7 loss to Napa High at Memorial Stadium.

Ryan ran the Crushers’ spread offense with very good poise, command and determination. He was sharp with his passes. He ran well in the open field.

“He played hard until the end,” said Crushers coach Billy Smith. “Sean played awesome. For four years, he brought a lot of excitement. I’m so proud of him.”

Ryan ran for 63 yards on 11 carries, and was pressured a lot of the time by Napa’s pass rush. He also completed 8-of-17 passes for 92 yards.

Most importantly, he didn’t have any turnovers, keeping Vintage right in the game. Their season came to an end, however, with Fairfield’s playoff-clinching 52-23 win over Armijo.

The Falcons, who beat the Crushers 26-21, advance as the Monticello Empire League’s No. 3 team for the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division I playoffs, which start Nov. 21.

“We wanted to come out with a win,” said Ryan. “We just haven’t been able to put things together this year. We left about 14 or 21 points (on the field) that we could have scored. Those are some of the things that we didn’t clean up this year.

“Little things were holding us back this year. We didn’t clean those up.”

Ryan’s 26-yard pass to Jacob Roscoe gave Vintage the ball on Napa’s 11-yard line on the opening possession of the game for the Crushers. On the next play, Roscoe ran 11 yards for the game’s first touchdown at the 8:44 mark of the first quarter. It was a drive of 42 yards in four plays.

“Sean is one of the fastest kids in the league,” said Roscoe. “I thought he played pretty good. He had some good runs. They had pressure on him and he just took off.”

Roscoe rushed for 50 yards on 12 carries and finished the year with 985 yards — just 15 shy of the century mark. He missed a MEL game against Vacaville with an injury to his neck.

Late in the first half, Ryan drove the Crushers (4-6 overall, 2-3 MEL) from their own 20-yard line to the Napa 2. Ryan completed passes of 9 yards to Reed Huddleston, 14 yards to Alex Peterson and 9 yards to Trevor McLaughlin. The biggest play in the march was Ryan’s 38-yard run to the Indians’ 9.

Ryan carried for nine more yards to the Napa 2-yard line, but was stopped short of the goal line by Napa’s swarming defense.

Jonny Avalos’ 17-yard field goal attempt as time ran out to tie the game at halftime was blocked by Brandon Washington.

“Things didn’t go our way tonight,” said Ryan. “We knew the middle was wide open when we were in our spread formation. We had a quarterback draw that worked a couple of times. The offensive line did a great job.

“I’m happy with the way the first drive went. (Napa’s) a good team. Every game I feel like I can play better. I know I could have played better this game.”

On its second series of the second half, Vintage had a time-consuming drive, moving from its 20 to the Napa 8. Ryan rushed for 26 yards in the drive and  threw for 17 more.

The drive ended on a fumbled snap when the Crushers lined up for a 35-yard field goal attempt.

Vintage’s final possession of the game — played before a crowd of 6,800 on an unusually warm and windy mid November evening — stalled after four plays, with the Crushers turning it over on downs.

Napa did a very good job of going after Ryan and keeping Vintage’s receivers covered.

In order to have qualified for the playoffs, Vintage needed a win over Napa and for Fairfield to lose.

The loss was Vintage’s third straight in the Big Game.