El Capitan High head coach Xavier Ramirez has expressed over and over how much he loves the fight and grit his team has shown early this season. However, at the same time Ramirez wonders when the Gauchos will stop hurting themselves.

 

The Gauchos finished on the wrong side of the scoreboard for the first time this season with a 35-27 loss to Sacred Heart Prep on Friday night at Merced College’s Stadium ‘76. El Capitan ultimately couldn’t overcome self-inflicted mistakes, particularly penalties, which affected their ability to sustain drives offensively and stop the Gators (1-1) consistently. “Any time you look at a drive where they scored, I think there was a penalty involved,” said Ramirez, whose team dropped to 2-1 this season. “We’ve got to help ourselves out. We’ve got to play better, disciplined football.”

 

The Gauchos had their bright spots as quarterback Gio Mendoza threw for four touchdowns and 241 yards. Star receiver A.J. Jones turned in some big plays, hauling touchdown catches of 76 and 73 yards in the first half as he finished with 5 catches for 171 yards and two scores. The quick scores are nice, but the Gauchos were unable to sustain long drives on offense. 

 

The big plays also meant the El Capitan defense was right back on the field and they struggled to stop the Gators running attack. Sacred Heart Prep running back Cooper Karros rushed for 116 yards and three touchdowns on 16 carries. Maxime Morelle added 130 yards and a touchdown on 13 carries.

 

“They were able to move the ball,” Ramirez said. “They did a good job of running the ball against us. We had a hard time stopping the dive. We had a hard time stopping the toss to the boundary. We have to get back to the drawing board. It’'s not a loss if you can learn from this so we need to learn from this.”

 

The Gauchos were able to overcome mistakes and early deficits to rally to victories in their first two games against Hoover and Central Valley. El Capitan appeared to be on its way to doing the same thing on Friday night after the Gators jumped out to a 14-0 lead. 

 

Mendoza found running back Lorenzo Peters for an 8-yard touchdown pass to pull the Gauchos within 14-7 with 11:09 left in the first quarter. That started a flurry of touchdowns as Sacred Heart Prep answered two plays later with a Karros’ 49-yard touchdown run to push the lead back to 21-7 with 10:33 left in the half. El Capitan then needed only two plays to counter as Jones hauled in a 76-yard touchdown pass from Mendoza to cut the lead to 21-14 with 9:39 left in the second quarter. 

 

After the Gauchos defense came up with a stop, Mendoza and Jones connected again on a 73-yard touchdown throw and catch to pull even at 21-21 with 5:22 left in the first half. “It's great when you have a guy like AJ, but again we have to be able to sustain drives. It’s a big play, but we’re putting our defense out on the field again. I do think we need to find some stability and we have to put together drives.”

 

The Gauchos took their first lead of the game at 27-21 with 8:05 left in the third quarter after Mendoza found Austin Gooding for a 10-yard touchdown pass. However, that was the only points the Gauchos scored in the second half as the Gators closed the game with 14 unanswered points.

 

Despite the loss, Ramirez is still happy with where his team is at after three games and heading into their bye next week. “We played four quarters of football, and we could have easily packed it in down 14-0 or 21-7,” Ramirez said. “We came back, tied it and took the lead. We just have to be able to put teams away when we have the lead.”

Shawn Jansen is the MUHSD Program Manager Digital Media. He can be reached at Sjansen@muhsd.org.