Lathrop struggled to get going offensively Friday night, dropping the Western Athletic Conference opener 24-7 to Johansen on Bennie Gatto field at Paul Wiggins Stadium.
The two-time defending champion Spartans (0-1, 1-3 overall) had a streak of 15 straight conference victories snapped.
“We didn’t play our best game tonight,” Lathrop head coach Justin Muschott said. “You have a team on the other side of the ball that wants to take it to you, and when you make the mistakes we did and you don’t play clean football you aren’t going to win very often.”
The loss to the Vikings (1-0, 3-1) is the second straight at home for Lathrop after the Spartans fell to Tracy 56-0. Johansen came into the contest fresh having not played last week after getting handled 36-6 at East Union two weeks ago.
If the first half is any indication of how WAC play will go for teams this season, yards and points will be hard to come by. Neither team managed to get a first down in the opening quarter, with both defenses coming up with big plays on third down to get their units off of the field.
“I thought we came in with a really good plan defensively,” Muschott said. “Credit to our staff, they put our guys in the right spots, and you can’t ask much more out of our defense than what you saw early on.”
Offensively, Lathrop shot itself in the foot on multiple occasions with penalties early on, putting its Pistol Wing-T in low percentage third and long situations.
After a scoreless first, the Vikings got on the board first early in the second quarter when on third and long Johansen quarterback AJ Banuelos (171 yards passing) found Mathayus Looney Napper from 47 yards out on a busted coverage from the Spartans to put the visitors up, 6-0.
After another Lathrop three-and-out, Banuelos would throw his second touchdown pass of the evening to senior standout Jeydan Saing (3 catches, 45 yards) on a crossing route that saw the wide receiver break two Spartans tackles before getting to the edge and sprinting for a 36-yard touchdown reception. A Banuelos-to-Saing two-point try made it 14-0 heading into the half.
“Honestly, I was so mad at myself for having a couple of drops earlier in the game, I just needed to make that play so bad,” Saing said. “I refused to go down and got a great block to get me to the sideline, and from there I knew they weren’t catching me.”
Unable to move the ball effectively on the ground, Muschott turned to signal caller DJ Reyno (146 yards passing) to get the Spartans going. Reyno had come into Friday’s contest having thrown just 36 passes in three games. The junior threw 24 times with the Spartans trailing for most of the game, his best pass coming on the final play of the third quarter when after buying time with his legs he found Ekam Sohal (three catches, 73 yards) across the middle. Sohal made a defender miss before going 69 yards to the end zone to make it a one score game heading into the final quarter.
“Obviously, we don’t want to throw as much as we had to tonight, but we have always taken what the defense gives us,” Muschott said. “I thought DJ made some really good plays out there and kept us in the game late despite the mistakes we made as a team.”
With his team up just seven early in the fourth, Banuelos answered the bell for the Vikings one last time. After the Spartans forced a third and long situation, the Johansen quarterback evaded rushers and found Joel Murillo who walked in for a 32-yard touchdown to quiet the crowd that had felt momentum shift towards the home side late in the game. Johansen would add a 35-yard field goal from Brian Paramo just three minutes later to cap the scoring at 24-7.
“We lost a heartbreaker to these guys last year so this one feels really good,” Saing said. “Anytime you get to get into the victory formation against a team like this, you know you played a really good game of football.”
Lathrop will look to move to 1-1 in league play next week as they host Pacheco.
“Pacheco plays us tough every time we see them,” Muschott said. “We’ll look to have a good week of practice and clean up the mistakes and get this thing back on the right track.
SCORING SUMMARY
Johansen 0 14 0 10 — 24
Lathrop 0 0 7 0 — 7
Second quarter
J — Mathayus Looney Napper 47 pass from AJ Banuelos (kick failed), 9:35.
J — Jeydan Saing 36 pass from Banuelos (pass good), 2:14.
Third quarter
L — Ekam Sohal 69 pass from DJ Reyno (Jaylen Santos kick), 0:00.
Fourth quarter
J — Joel Murillo 32 pass from Banuelos (Brian Paramo kick), 9:37.
J — Paramo 35 field goal, 6:04.
