After falling behind early, Raider Football couldn’t catch up against Citrus College in a game that was won on third downs with a score of 29-16.
The Raiders were not able to convert on third downs when they were on offense and were forced to punt the ball.
Will Thurston, Football Coach of the Raiders talked about how his offense was affected on third downs.
“We were third and short, so we were third and two, third and four and we could not convert on at least six opportunities on third down which forced us to have to punt the ball over to the defense,” said Thurston.
The Raiders fell behind 16-0 in the second quarter but were able to start a comeback when QB Brent Stevens threw a six-yard touchdown pass to Cheldon West to keep them in the game at 16-7. Both teams scored only on field goals in the third quarter with the Raiders hitting a 46-yard field goal from Derek Kirk. Trailing in the fourth quarter 29-10, Stevens led his team on a 72- yard drive to find Dvonte Willis for a thirteen-yard touchdown pass. It was too late as Citrus College ended up winning the game 29-16.
Athletic Director Howard Davis talked about the loss to Citrus College.
“I didn’t feel like our team played their best game. We appeared a little out-of-sync as compared to our win at Orange Coast College. Ben Conlin, our starting QB, suffered a concussion that was not discovered until Wednesday. So, we had just a couple days to prepare to replace that critical position,” said Davis.
Davis also talked about one of the weaknesses that the Raider Football team faced.
“Brent Stevens filled in admirably, and played well. But, a change at that position can be disconcerting for a team. In addition, Brent is one of our best receivers, so we didn’t have him at that position either. Nonetheless, we could have played better. We hope to play better this Saturday against a very tough Santa Ana College team,” said Davis.
“I thought that we made styling mistakes, we didn’t know where we were when we were on defense but it is easy to fix and in this next game we are going to do a lot better with that,” said DE Tyler Murphy.
The Raiders will be facing Santa Ana College on Saturday, September 15th at 1p.m. at Griffin Stadium.
