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By Richard Bravo
The Ray Junior High Football team traveled to San Carlos last Tues. and walked away with a win in a high scoring affair. The Junior Cats piled up 310 yards of total offense and had nine touchdowns in a 68-52 win over the Braves.
The first quarter the Junior Cats scored twice on a pass and run play as quarterback Cole Yocum had a 18-yard run and running back Jonah Cude added a 27-yard run to give the Junior Cats a 16-0 lead.
In the second quarter, the Junior Cats kept the ball on the ground getting another touchdown on Paul Michael Wormwood’s 37-yard run to put the cats up 24-0. Wormwood struck again on defense as he intercepted the Braves quarterback and ran it 28 yards for another Cats touchdown to extend the lead to 32-0.
The Braves didn’t go away and got on the scoreboard on a huge run of 72 yards to slightly trim the lead to 32-8. On the ensuing kickoff returner Fabian Valenzuela nearly ran it 80 yards for the score, but was brought down 4 yards shy of the score. This set up a 4 yard run by Wormwood to bring the score to 40-8 late in the first half.
The Braves added another score on a 15-yard pass right before the half to head into the locker room trailing 40-16.
The Junior Cats continued their dominance entering the second half forcing the Apaches to fumble the kickoff when Bearcat Yocum hit a Brave returner sending the ball into the end zone. The ball was quickly recovered by Chandler Coleman for the first score of the half bringing the score to 48-16.
On the Apaches next possession, they coughed up the ball once again and fumbled the ball on their 10-yard line. Linebacker Yocum scooped up the ball and ran it into the end zone for yet another score giving the Junior Cats a demanding 54-16 lead.
The Braves added two more scores themselves to cut down on the Cats lead halfway through the third trailing 54-28. With lead shortened to 26 points the Junior Cat offense rumbled back getting two more scores on runs of 72 and 12 by Wormwood to end the third quarter with a score of 68-28.
The fourth quarter saw the younger Junior Cats on the field getting their feel for the game. Getting some experience under their belt the Junior Cats played excellent against the Braves starters. The Braves got a few scores in the fourth quarter but, it still was not enough for the win as the Junior Cats came away with the 68-52 Victory.
The Bearcats offensively did a solid job. Yocum had 5 passes for 91 yards on 6 attempts. Leading rusher Wormwood ran for 141 yards on 6 carries. Leading receiver was Jordan Pace with 49 yards on 2 catches.
Defensively the Bearcats were led by Wormwood, Yocum, and Bobby Mesa with 5 tackles each, Jalen Pacheco, Dillon Sanders and Nathan Molar helped with two tackles each. Sanders and Wormwood also had an interception each.
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