PANTHERS POUNCE EARLY AND OFTEN
Chico shows no signs of rust after 16-month layoff, up next is PV
One glance of Friday’s final score between Chico High and Corning High, a 49- 0 win in favor of the Panthers, may have appeared deceiving. At least considering which team played last week, and which hadn’t played since 2019.
While Corning opened its season with a win against Las Plumas one week ago, the Panthers were 16 months removed from playing their last true game prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
They showed no signs of rust when they kicked off Friday.
On Chico’s first play from scrimmage running back Anthony Seiler, a sophomore, took
a handoff from quarterback Jake Hamman up the right side and outran the Cardinals’ defense en route to a 67-yard score.
Hamman then connected with Nino Larocca on the next drive, a 62-yard bomb down to the 1-yard line, with Makoa Brown finishing off the drive with a 1-yard plunge. That was their fourth play.
By play number eight, Hamman was scrambling around Corning’s defense before carv
ing out space along Chico’s sideline to find Adon Newberry in the left corner of the end zone.
By halftime, Chico (1- 0) held a commanding 35- 0 lead and allowed many of the Panthers’ starters to take an early rest in the second half, giving younger and new varsity players a chance to take some snaps.
“The kids have just been dying to play. I just think they were literally so excited and so thankful to be playing. It really showed tonight,” Chico head coach Jason Alvistur said.
With Chico leading 21- 0 to begin the second quarter, Corning’s Nico Garcia grabbed an interception on a deep pass. The Cardinals, however, punted back to Chico four players later and Seiler seized another scoring opportunity with a 21yard run into the end zone.
“We’ve been practicing as a team for a long time,” Seiler said. “To play a game with each other, we’ve just been excited.”
Corning (1-1) crossed midfield on its next possession, with Garcia hitting Caelan Maeder for nine yards, before mixing running plays with Garcia and Nick Brown. But the drive ended abruptly when Chico’s Seth Cook forced an interception, leading to the Panthers’ longest offensive sequence of the first half, which lasted seven plays and ended with Hamman rolling out to his left and charging toward the pylon untouched for 67 yards.
In Chico’s postgame huddle, coaches praised the Panthers’ energy, seemingly easy to summon for a team longing to play a game again. They were also quick to remind players of their next opponent, the crosstown Pleasant Valley Vikings, and why Friday’s celebration will be short-lived when preparing for a rivalry game in this shortened spring season.
“That’s what the coaches were talking about — we can’t get too high, we can’t be floating around thinking about our win over Corning too much,” Hamman said. “We got to get back to work. It’s a big game. We’ve been waiting for it for a while.”
“PV is the team we want to beat. That’s our goal,” Seiler said.