Los Lunas romps; heartbreak for Eagles and Jags

Los Lunas

Once again, a quick start carried Los Lunas (7-2, 3-0) to a dominating victory, this time a 57-6 romp over Santa Fe (1-7, 0-2) Friday at Willie Chavez Stadium on Senior Night.

For the second straight game, Los Lunas scored at least 29 first-quarter points and for the fourth straight contest, LLHS won by the mercy rule.

“I love the way we’re executing on both sides of the ball,” Tigers’ coach Greg Henington said. “We’re looking clean, explosive.”

Quarterback Kaiden Reese started the scoring explosion with a 19-yard touchdown run. Reese added two touchdown passes to Ethan Olguin and one on a shovel pass to Fabian Trujillo.

Emi De la Torre found the end zone twice in the first half, while Damasio Kaneshiro scored once to give the Tigers’ a 51-6 lead at the half.

The third quarter was scoreless, but the game ended late in the fourth quarter when Luke Cieremans hit pay dirt.

The Tigers have plenty of offensive weapons in the arsenal, with seven different players scoring touchdowns against the Demons.

“What we’ve been trying to do is maximize our talent, get as many people involved as possible,” said Henington.

LLHS has a bye week and then goes on the road to play Clovis (3-5,2-0) in a game that will likely decide the district 6-5A title.

 

Belen

Belen was unable to hold a fourth-quarter lead and remains winless after a 32-30 loss to Highland (5-3, 1-0) Friday at Eagles Stadium.

The 30 points was the most the Eagles (0-8, 0-1) scored this season.

“Our offense got rolling a bit. We made some good plays,” coach Kevin Peña said, pointing to offensive standouts Damian Avila, Augustine Lopez and Derian Rodriguez. “We had some nice plays by our backs, but we just didn’t finish it.”

After trailing 20-15 at the half, BHS scored 15 unanswered points in the third quarter to take a 30-20 advantage heading into the final stanza.

However, Highland scored early in the fourth quarter to pull within six points. On the ensuing kickoff, a Belen fumble set the Hornets up for the go-ahead touchdown and a 32-30 victory.

“This one is frustrating, this one hurts,” is how Peña summed it up, after recalling some of the “what ifs” that included a dropped pass in the end zone and a potential missed interception.

“We had our opportunities to win it and really pull this game out,” said the coach. “We just didn’t make the plays when we needed to.”

Even though the Eagles haven’t won a game yet, with two district games remaining they are not out of the playoff picture. BHS finishes on the road at Miyamura (3-5, 0-1) this Friday with the regular season finale Oct. 27 at home against Piedra Vista (3-5, 1-0.)

 

Valencia

It came down to the final seconds Friday between St. Pius and Valencia, with a Jaguars field goal try going wide left to secure a 20-18 victory for the visiting Sartans (4-4, 1-0.)

Despite the defeat, VHS coach Ledarrius Cage said it was exciting to be in a tight contest.

“It was fun to have that type of competition,” Cage said. “All of our other games have been ‘win big or lose big.’”

The night started on a promising note for Valencia when Isaiah Rodriguez dropped a punt inside the two-yard line. On the next play, VHS forced a safety to take a 2-0 lead.

Danny Villagas, who rushed for 181 yards, gave Valencia a 10-8 lead at the half with his first rushing touchdown of the game. His 17-yard run in the fourth quarter regained the lead for VHS.

St. Pius scored with three minutes left to go back in front to set up the last second drama. After driving down the field, Valencia missed the potential game winning field goal.

Valencia’s struggles in the red zone may have been the difference, with three trips inside the 20-yard line coming up empty.

“We know how close we were to making a lot of big plays,” Cage said, adding that injuries to three players forced the coaches to “shrink the playbook.”

Valencia (4-4, 0-1) closes out a three-game home stand Friday against Grants (4-4,0-1.)