Daryl Bogard, UNI Football Boosters
Game Date: September 1, 2023 7:00PM PST | Photography by: Sandrine Scherson
The University Trojans leveraged a balanced offensive attack, scored all three times they reached the red zone and made some big defensive plays to defeat the Los Amigos Lobos 21-7 at home Fri night, Sep 1.
Uni drove the ball 66 yards on the opening drive mixing runs and passes culminating in a one-yard Jai Williams touchdown run. Los Amigos followed with a six-minute, 50-yard drive that stalled at the Uni 27-yard line.
Late in the second quarter, Uni scored on a 72-yard drive with Williams carrying the ball six times for 65 yards before QB Koa Saito hit WR Brooks Beckmann on a 7-yard touchdown pass to put the Trojans up 14-0 with 1:23 to go in the first half.
The marching band honored their seniors just before performing at halftime.
On the first play from scrimmage in the second half, Beckmann picked off an errant Los Amigos pass and returned it to the Lobos two-yard line being knocked out of bounds and out of the game. On the next play, Saito found WR Blaine Anderson on a crossing pattern for a scoring strike putting the Trojans up 21-0. Saito has thrown half a dozen TD passes in the last two games, three each to Beckmann and Anderson.
The Lobos controlled the ball for over 17 minutes in the second half while the Trojans had it for less than seven minutes. Despite the time advantage, Los Amigos and their run-oriented offense could only muster one score, a six-yard run by Peter Hernandez with just under three minutes to go in the third quarter.
Uni made numerous defensive stops in the second half with Owen Chiou counting four sacks for 33 yards of losses.
Each team had 198 yards from the line of scrimmage for the game. Uni’s balanced attack included 86 yards of rushing and 112 through the air. On the other hand, Los Amigos ran the ball 44 times for 184 yards, while completing 3 of 8 passes for just 14 yards. Uni had 15 first downs (7 run, 6 pass, 2 penalty) to 11 for the opposition (10 run, 1 penalty).
Williams accounted for 78 yards on the ground on 12 carries. After Williams left the game, Asger Ross had 7 runs for 18 yards. Eithar Takesh ran the ball once for six yards and a first down.
Saito was 9 for 14 with one interception for 112 yards. Anderson had 6 catches for 83 yards while Beckmann had 3 for 29. Anderson also had a 25-yard kickoff return giving him 108 all-purpose yards.
The Uni defense stopped Los Amigos 11 times for negative yardage. Takesh led the way with a season-high14 tackles, his third game with double digit tackles. Chiou had eight. Richard Bines was involved in six tackles including a sack and three tackles for loss. Geoff Soriano was active with 6 tackles. Beckmann and Luke Edwards each had five tackles with Edwards including a tackle for loss.
The Uni kicking game was in order. Skye Murphy had a fine kicking game being perfect on all three extra points and booming three of his four kickoffs into or out of the end zone. Andrew Bogard punted twice for 35 and 26, yards, respectively, with the second one late in the fourth quarter into a stiff breeze.
Beckmann, Williams and Saito all suffered injuries during the game and we are hoping that they are not too serious. Uni improved to 1-2 on the season and faces Loara on the road next week.
