Rockhold Rolls for El Capitan

Tenth-ranked Kearny, a team with 14 returning starters, opened against El Capitan at Mesa College on Friday and got rocked. Or was it Rockhold?

Senior running back Eric Rockhold rushed for 261 yards on 13 carries, scored two touchdowns on 73-yard runs in the second half and kicked a 30-yard field goal to lead the 1991 Grossmont 2-A champions to a 24-7 upset over the Komets.

Kearny, expected to contend for the City Western League title with experience and explosive running back James Curtis, has lost five consecutive games dating back to last season. The Komets, who opened 1991 with seven victories in a row, are not used to starting the season with a loss to El Capitan. But it was the Vaqueros who thoroughly dominated.

“This is huge,” said Rockhold, a three-year letterman. “We haven’t beat these guys in four or five years.”

Not only did Rockhold upstage Curtis (17 carries, 114 yards), El Capitan punished Kearny. The Vaquero offense racked up 407 yards and averaged 9.25 yards per play, and the Komets never really got in sync after quarterback Sam Norris overthrew a wide-open Travis Kant with a bomb on its first play from scrimmage.

El Capitan held Kearny to 52 yards total offense in the first half--31 of them coming on a Curtis touchdown run--but managed only a 10-7 lead at the half. Mostly because the Vaqueros stopped themselves.

After Rockhold capped an opening 74-yard march with his field goal and James Hopkins scored on a three-yard run on El Capitan’s second possession, the Vaqueros turned the ball over twice, ended one drive at the Kearny 21 and finished another with Rockhold missing a 34-yard field-goal attempt. They punted only once.

“We had some fun,” said Rockhold. “I made a lot of mistakes, but our line’s really doing a good job. We’re going to be better than we were last year, but people are underestimating us. We have to prove we’re legitimate.”

Rockhold made no mistakes on his two big runs, one a perfectly executed counter and the other a sprint straight up field.

“He’s a good runner,” Curtis said of Rockhold, who had 106 yards in the first half. “I was a little frustrated. Our offense wasn’t clicking. But we’ll get it together. This is a learning experience.”