Football Preview: Banning Pilots vs. Palos Verdes Sea Kings
Banning hasn't had much luck against Palos Verdes recently, but that could start to change on Friday. The Banning Pilots will be playing in front of their home fans against the Palos Verdes Sea Kings at 7:00 p.m. Banning will be looking to keep their seven-game home win streak dating back to last season alive.
Banning is probably headed into the game with a chip on their shoulder considering Western just ended the team's three-game winning streak on Friday. They took a hard 53-35 fall against the Pioneers. The loss was the Pilots' first of the season.
Despite the loss, Banning got top-tier performance from Steven Perez, who picked up 128 receiving yards and a touchdown, and also rushed for 122 yards and a touchdown on only six carries. Perez's longest reception was for an impressive 68 yards, which helps to explain his lofty yards per catch total. Another player making a difference was Noa Tuvalu, who rushed for 34 yards and a touchdown.
He was just one part of a punishing run game: Banning was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 313 rushing yards. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now rushed for at least 313 rushing yards in four consecutive matches.
Meanwhile, it's never fun to lose, and it's even less fun to lose 41-7, which was the final score in Palos Verdes' tilt against Edison on Friday.
Having lost for the first time this season, Banning fell to 3-1. As for Palos Verdes, their defeat dropped their record down to 2-2.
Banning was taken down by Palos Verdes 49-18 when the teams last played back in September of 2023. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Palos Verdes' Ryan Rakowski, who threw for 173 yards and two touchdowns while completing 81.8% of his passes, and also rushed for 35 yards and a touchdown. Now that Banning knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
