CLU Suffers Through a Long Day in Azusa

It was standard schoolyard etiquette when the Cal Lutheran football team played Azusa Pacific on Saturday afternoon.

The bigger, stronger guys were playing at home, and they were not about to share the ball. They ran, passed and kicked it with impunity, and when the other guys got the ball the big guys simply took it back.

This time, though, Cal Lutheran wasn’t playing the bully. Azusa Pacific, traditional whipping boy of Cal Lutheran, applied the whipping in the nonconference opener, 41-13. It could have been worse.

“Anytime to beat Cal Lutheran is a very big win for us,” Azusa Pacific Coach Jim Milhon said.

In winning for only the third time in the teams’ 17 meetings, Azusa Pacific held Cal Lutheran to 97 yards and two first downs.

“We weren’t ready to play,” Joe Harper said after his debut as Cal Lutheran coach. “The team looked very poorly coached. We made too many mistakes. We did not execute offensively or defensively.”

The Cal Lutheran offense failed to score and the Kingsmen’s most effective weapon was the punt, which they used 12 times. They scored their first touchdown when linebacker Kevin Evans snatched the ball in mid-air after a blocked punt and ran in from three yards.

That tied the score, 7-7. Azusa Pacific took a 21-7 halftime lead with two touchdowns in the final three minutes of the half.

Nonetheless, it was still a game when Cal Lutheran safety Nicko Rising returned an interception 30 yards for a touchdown early in the third quarter. Feliciano Ramirez’s conversion pass was intercepted, but Cal Lutheran trailed by only 21-13.

The Cal Lutheran offense bottomed out in the third quarter, though. The Kingsmen held the ball for slightly more than four minutes and had minus-12 yards.

Azusa Pacific gradually wore down the Cal Lutheran defense on a day when the field temperature was estimated at 120 degrees.

Jim Petrotta capped a nine-play Azusa Pacific drive with a 28-yard field goal midway through the third quarter. Five minutes later, Brian Hunt, who passed for 314 yards, hit Corey Smith with an eight-yard scoring toss to finish an 80-yard march.

Azusa Pacific took advantage of consecutive fumbles by Cal Lutheran kick returner Cassidy O’Sullivan to score 10 points early in the fourth quarter.

In his first college game, freshman Ramirez completed three of 17 passes for 47 yards with two interceptions. O’Sullivan, a wide receiver, rushed for 11 yards but had 146 return yards.