El Modena Sets a Tone Early

Adam Lancisero scored two first quarter touchdowns to lead El Modena to a 36-0 victory over Garden Grove Friday night at El Modena.

Lancisero, an All-Century League first-team selection on defense last season, proved just as tough on offense, carrying nine times on the first two drives to give the Vanguards a quick 14-0 advantage.

El Modena Coach Jason Hitchens took some chances early, trying to instill confidence in his squad which had only one victory last season.

On its first possession, El Modena picked up nine yards on three Lancisero’s carries to set up a fourth-down situation on its own 48.

The Vanguards went for the first down and Michael Pitre converted, running for four yards to keep the drive going.

“I wanted to let the players know I had a lot of confidence in them as well as some of our newer coaches,” Hutchins said.

El Modena was otherwise conservative on its first two drives, attempting only one pass attempted in each.

Lancisero scored twice from the one-yard line and Marcos Chavez made both his conversion kicks to give El Modena a 14-point lead with two minutes, 52 seconds left in the first quarter.

Garden Grove threatened to score midway in the second quarter, but El Modena’s Joe Mitchell thwarted the effort by recovering a bad pitch at the Vanguard 17.

Pitre scored from one yard out with 6:04 left in the third quarter to increase El Modena’s lead to 21-0.

Kevin Brown threw a 25-yard touchdown pass to Brian Fischbeck and Buddy Klovstad kicked his second extra point of the game to increase the Vanguards’ lead to 28-0 with 5:38 left in the third quarter.

The quick score was set up by a fumble recovery by Lancisero.

Mitchell scored the final El Modena touchdown on a seven-yard run. Duane McCabe took a bad snap and ran for the conversion.

Lancisero led all rushers with 120 yards in 20 carries.