The Gavilan Rams have spent the first month of the 2007 football
season searching for an identity, trying to assure themselves that
a Coast Conference title is within their reach despite an
uninspiring 1-3 record.
Gilroy – The Gavilan Rams have spent the first month of the 2007 football season searching for an identity, trying to assure themselves that a Coast Conference title is within their reach despite an uninspiring 1-3 record.
A 35-point outburst in the second quarter did much to answer some questions Saturday night. The Rams used that surprise to ease past the rival Hartnell Panthers 45-0 on the Garcia-Elder Sports Complex turf.
Gavilan does not start the four-game Coast Conference test until a road test against the San Jose City Jaguars on Oct. 20. The lone remaining pre-conference game is at home Saturday night against the power College of the Sequoias.
“We’ve been working hard,” said winning coach John Lango. “We’ve been waiting a while to start doing things right. We were able the run the football and we were able to put pressure on Hartnell and make them throw off their system.”
Gavilan had a respectable evening running the ball, using a Tim Lango 125-yard effort on 22 carries to finish with 188 yards. Hartnell, turning almost exclusively to the air after falling behind, suffered a half-dozen sacks and lost the ball twice on bad punt snaps. The Panthers had a net loss of 16 yards in 23 running plays. The visitors managed 128 yards on an 18-of-34 effort and three interceptions for quarterback Edward Stefani.
The Rams had two solid scoring chances rebuffed in a scoreless first quarter, then struck for touchdowns on five of six possessions in the second quarter.
Lango, a freshman out of San Benito High, gave his coach-father a 45th birthday present by scoring from three yards out with 13:26 left in the half. Mike Blewett converted for the first of six successful PAT tries.
The Rams could not score on the following possession, but quickly scored again after a botched Panther punt snap left Gavilan in business at the Ram seven. Matt McCoy, one three King City Mustang products on the Ram roster, converted the turnover with a crisp seven-yard dash to paydirt at the 8:52 mark for a 14-0 cushion.
A 27-yard interception return by Steven Norman gave the Rams the ball at Hartnell’s 34. Five plays later, McCoy scored on a three-yard push at 5:18.
Another Hartnell punt try failed when the ground-ball snap was covered by the Rams at the Panther 15. Ellis Krout caught a one-yard pass from Nick Kalantari at 2:54 for a 28-0 edge.
Taylor Micali came up with an interception of a Stefani pass with one minute left until the intermission.
“We decided to work on our two-minute offense,” said Lango of the march to a 35-0 lead. The three-play effort covering 61 yards was capped by a Kalantari lob pass to Jeremy Burns that turned into a 35-yard scoring play.
The Rams kept on the pressure in the second half by scoring on the first two possessions. Blewett booted a 32-yard field goal at 9:05 of the third quarter after the Rams went 50 yards. A Hartnell fumble led to a 60-yard drive to a final Ram touchdown, Krout getting loose for the 36-yard scoring pass from Kalantari.
Kalantari played almost the entire game, connecting on 17-of-24 tosses for 239 yards.
Krout finished with 125 yards and two scores on nine catches.
