Glendale college football opens conference play with loss to West Los Angeles
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GLENDALE — With four nonconference games under its belt, it was finally time for the Glendale Community College football team to translate that experience and see what it could do against West Los Angeles college in the teams’ American Metro Conference opener.
The Wildcats made an immediate impact on the offense, running the ball down the field to score touchdowns in each of their first three possessions.
The West L.A. running game trucked it’s way to score five unanswered touchdowns to defeat Glendale, 54-6, Saturday afternoon at Sartoris Field.
“I kept asking for volunteers to go in from the sidelines to see who would like to tackle,” Glendale coach John Rome said. “I never seen anything like that. We looked like a Make-A-Wish team. I don’t know what to say. It’s unbelievable. I had never seen such poor tackling in my life. It’s ridiculous.”
The Wildcats’ defense tallied two sacks in the second quarter on Vaqueros starting Jorge Amaya, then intercepted a pair of passes from Vaqueros quarterback Nathan Eldridge.
Eldridge came on in the second half to finish with eight-of-13 passing for 74 yards and seven carries for 70 yards and the only Vaqueros touchdown.
The Glendale defense, meanwhile, has given up 104 points in its last two games.
West L.A. left Glendale scoreless up until 1:39 left in the game when Eldridge snuck in on for a three-yard score.
“It just comes down to, really, the basics right now with everybody executing on all cylinders,” Eldridge said. “It just seems like when one part of the offense is doing well, the other needs to pick it up. The plays that we were able to have success on were the plays that everybody was executing.”
Glendale running back Tru Fugate added 14 carries for 56 yards.
A trio of sophomore running backs scored for the Wildcats.
Devean Randall ran the ball 15 times for 147 yards and a touchdown, Darrian Boyd rushes eight times for 71 yards and a score and Justice Powers scored two touchdowns in eight carries for 102 yards.
West L.A. quarterback Austi Amor added a 31-yard rushing touchdown to go along with 166 yards passing and a touchdown on 12-of-17 passing
“We’re just glad to get this one and stay healthy to get on to the next one,” West L.A. coach Marguet Miller said. “We have another good opponent in L.A. Valley next week.
“Glendale was a good opponent and I was worried about them coming into the game. They have a good team and are definitely well-coached, so it was a good one for us.”
Randall ran the ball four times for 32 yards to set up a 31-yard quarterback scoring run at 12:16 in the first quarter.
Johnson then capped a 10-play, 93-yard drive with a 33-yard touchdown run to give West L.A. a 14-0 lead.
A 15-yard pass to Powers set up a three-score lead to start the second quarter before the Wildcats tacked on a 31-yard field goal to make 24-0 with 8:06 in the half.
West L.A. converted a fourth-and-16 situation on the Glendale 34 with a 24-yard pass on its way to a 14-yard touchdown run from Randall for the 31-0 lead with 19.9 left in the half.
It took three plays for the Wildcats to score in the second half, converting on a 29-yard run from Powers for his second rushing touchdown and a 38-0 lead.
The Wildcats added a 25-yard field goal six minutes later and took a 48-0 lead with a 40-yard run down the middle from Boyd to start the fourth quarter.
Eldridge engineered a 54-yard scoring drive with a three-yard quarterback keep to get Glendale on the board with 1:39 left. After the missed extra point, the Wildcats lead was cut to 48-6.
West L.A. immediately responded on its next drive with a 50-yard scoring run from Jerrian Anderson with 30.6 left. The Wildcats elected to take a knee on the two-point conversion.