Rams football opens season, blow past Jaguars 52-12

RIO RANCHO — Deja vu? No, just another dominant week one from the Rams.

For the second straight season, Rio Rancho has put up 50-plus points in its season opener, blowing past Atrisco Heritage Academy 52-12.

Head Coach Nate Pino’s squad let the stars loose, with highlight games from a plethora of names. Senior running back Ethan Rolon put together a multi-touchdown game, while Quintenn McKinley secured two interceptions in a pass coverage clinic.

Junior quarterback Micah Takahashi’s “video game”-esque speed, along with a Swiss Army knife of receiving weapons, put together a Friday night throttling of the Jaguars.

However, for every highlight play, there was soon a penalty marker down. While the talent and energy came through, the Rams will need to clean up the fine details for next week.

“Our big emphasis was effort last week and energy. And I thought our guys played hard,” Pino said. “We’ve got to clean up some details with the penalties and stuff, but I thought our guys executed pretty well.”

It wasn’t all energy from the start to finish, as a slow-to-start Rams offense opened the game with a Takahashi interception and a red zone stall that ended in a field goal.

But it was only a matter of time until the Rams’ weapons came through. Takahashi and Rolon got the run game going, while receivers Parker Miller and Matthew Stagman both posted highlight catches and contributed scores.

Jesse Campos was a force to be reckoned with on swing passes, with Ryder Sibley and Jace Lee joining in on the offensive fun as well. The list goes on and on.

“It feels great (to be back). You know, it’s been quite a while, and just all of the hard work of this off-season makes it all pay off this year,” Takahashi said. “We got a lot of flags, a lot of just procedural penalties, but overall, the offense we were running pretty smoothly.”

With week one behind them, the Rams will now look forward to their next opponent: the Clovis Wildcats.

“They (Clovis) do some different stuff,” Pino said. “They like to run the football, and it’s going to be a physical game. So we got to just be prepped for it.”

Both sitting at 1-0 after tonight, Rio Rancho and Clovis will take the field for week two on Aug. 29 for a 7 p.m. kickoff at Rio Rancho Stadium.