The Oak Ridge Trojans are taking a road trip to face off against the Rocklin Thunder at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. Each of these teams will be fighting to keep a win streak alive as Oak Ridge comes in on three and Rocklin on five.
Oak Ridge's defense heads into the matchup hoping to repeat the dominance they displayed on Friday. They breezed by Whitney to the tune of 63-0. Given the Trojans' advantage in MaxPreps' California football rankings (they are ranked 81st, while the Wildcats are ranked 283rd), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Phoenix Hester was a one-man wrecking crew for Oak Ridge as he threw for 132 yards and two touchdowns on perfect 7-for-7 passing, and also rushed for 49 yards and a touchdown. Jasen Womack also helped with four touchdowns in total.
Oak Ridge didn't go easy on the quarterback and picked off three passes before the game was over. The picks came courtesy of Womack and Issac Pierce.
Meanwhile, Rocklin won against Granite Bay last Friday with 35 points and they decided to stick to that point total again on Friday. Rocklin blew past Del Oro 35-14. With the Thunder ahead 28-0 at the half, the game was all but over already.
Rocklin's win was the result of several impressive offensive performances. One of the most notable came from Rafi Merino, who rushed for 120 yards and a touchdown on only 13 carries, and also picked up 31 receiving yards. Reeve Slone was another key player, throwing for 199 yards and two touchdowns on only 16 passes.
Rocklin was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 230 rushing yards. They easily outclassed their opponents in that department as Del Oro only rushed for 29.
One reason for the win was Rocklin's imposing defense, which managed to get into the backfield for four sacks. In that department, Henry Hatada was the leader with two. Rocklin got some further help from Alex Durham: he picked up a sack and made ten total tackles.
Oak Ridge now has a winning record of 5-4. As for Rocklin, they pushed their record up to 8-1 with the win, which was their third straight on the road.
Oak Ridge came up short against Rocklin in their previous meeting back in October of 2023, falling 21-17. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Slone, who rushed for 91 yards and a touchdown on only six carries, and also threw for 128 yards on 11 of 19 attempts. Now that Oak Ridge 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
