Football Preview: Antelope Valley Antelopes vs. Highland Bulldogs
The Antelope Valley Antelopes have the luxury of staying home for another week and will welcome the Highland Bulldogs at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Antelope Valley is strutting in with some offensive muscle as they've averaged 30 points per game this season.
Antelope Valley is probably headed into the game with a chip on their shoulder considering Palmdale just ended the team's three-game winning streak on Friday. They lost 35-14 to the Falcons. The Antelopes have struggled against the Falcons recently, as their game on Friday was their fifth consecutive lost matchup.
Despite the defeat, Antelope Valley got top-tier performance from Gavin Houston, who rushed for 221 yards while picking up 9.2 yards per carry. The dominant performance gave Houston a new career-high in rushing yards.
Even though they lost, Antelope Valley was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 308 rushing yards. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now rushed for at least 183 rushing yards in five consecutive contests.
Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Highland). They breezed by Eastside at home to the tune of 84-0 on Friday. The victory was nothing new for the Bulldogs as they're now sitting on four straight.
The critical scores for Highland came from Mekhi Free, Leonidas Saenz, and Dallas Peoples.
Highland wouldn't let Eastside keep a hold of the ball as they managed to force three fumbles. It was truly a group effort as Byron Arias, Jayden Carrillo, and Kwabena Okyere picked up one apiece. Carrillo is also on a roll when it comes to total tackles, as he's now made six or more in the last four games he's played dating back to last season. Highland got some further help from Johnathan Navarro: he picked up two sacks and made eight total tackles (3.0 for loss).
Antelope Valley now has a losing record at 3-4. As for Highland, their win was their third straight at home, which pushed their record up to 4-3.
Antelope Valley took a serious blow against Highland in their previous meeting back in October of 2023, falling 42-13. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Highland's Justin Wyatt Jr., who threw for 233 yards and three touchdowns while picking up 11.1 yards per attempt, and also rushed for 72 yards and a touchdown on only six carries. Now that Antelope Valley knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps