GILA RIDGE
a 14-yard touchdown pass to Jackson Sheppeard in the fourth quarter. Like the first two, it came on a fade pattern.
“Honestly, I don’t work on throwing that much,” Randle said. “They trusted me, told me to put the ball outside and trust my receivers, and they did their job and came down with the ball. They made me look good.”
“David’s an athlete, and he’s such a smart kid that he picks things up really easily,” Semler said. “And we have good targets for him to throw those fade routes to, and that helps a lot.”
Sheppeard led all receivers with three catches for 61 yards, and Jones added three catches for 52 yards, though he was ejected from the game in the third quarter.
Gila Ridge junior running back Renan Duarte carried 14 times for 80 yards and one touchdown, and four other Hawks had at least 28 yards rushing — including sophomore Benjamin King (7 car., 47 yards) and D’Angelo Garcia (5 car., 38 yards).
Kofa’s offense, meanwhile, could get nothing going against Gila Ridge’s defense outside of junior running back Jamar McFarlane, who rushed 20 times for 101 yards. Senior quarterback Robert Cancio completed just 3 of 15 attempts for 12 yards and one interception, and was sacked four times.
Kofa totaled 98 yards of offense as a team.
“We just weren’t ready today,” Kofa coach David Diehl said. “We weren’t ready to win a game on the road against a good Yuma team.”
The Kings didn’t pick up their first first-down of the night until their final drive of the first half, one on which McFarlane carried seven times for 50 yards. That drive reached Gila Ridge’s 24-yard line, but ended in a turnover on downs.
The Kings reached Hawks territory only once more all night.
“Jamar was making good reads, good cuts, running hard, but Jamar always runs hard,” Diehl said. “We’ve just got to string stuff together more.”
Kofa dropped to 0-4 overall with the loss, and all four defeats have come by at least 20 points.
Gila Ridge (2-2 overall), meanwhile, was coming off its first win of the season, a 16-3 victory over Imperial (Calif.) on Aug. 31. That was followed by a bye week, during which Semler decided to try Randle out at quarterback in place of junior Kaleb Cota, who was 30 for 71 for 362 yards and six interceptions through the first three weeks.
“Just to see what we can do with a different athlete back there,” Semler said. “Both quarterbacks are more than capable of running the offense.”
Randle played a bit at quarterback a year ago after Cota was lost for the season due to an injury suffered in game three, but Randle wasn’t very effective in his appearances — finishing the 2017 season just 8 for 26 throwing.
On Friday, he finished 9 for 16 for 143 yards and the three touchdowns, to go along with 18 rushing yards.
“I’ve got to give it to the people up front, they blocked amazing,” Randle said. “The running backs ran hard, the receivers ran good routes and were open all night. I just had to put the ball up there and give them a shot.”