Rams blast Cabrillo 44-2 in opener
By Bonta Hill
Editor
City College of San Francisco opened the 2008 football season with a bang, crushing the Cabrillo Seahawks 44-2.
Rams’ Quarterback Chris Forni completed 19 of his 26 pass attempts for 330 yards passing, and threw touchdowns to five different receivers. The defending national champions dominated both sides of the ball, rolling up 514 yards of total offense, and limiting Cabrillo to 214 yards.
“You know overall [Forni] played well, and did well under pressure,” said George Rush, who is in entering his 32nd year as City College Head Football Coach. “Defense gave up a couple pass plays, missed a couple tackles, but overall we shutout their offense.”
Forni added, ”The young offensive line did a great job of protecting me. We didn’t look too bad at all for our first game.”
The Rams started the scoring when Forni dropped back and hit a pass to tight end Melvin Blue. As Blue was heading to the goal line he fumbled, but wide receiver Randall Washington was in the right place at the right time. Washington recovered the fumble in the end zone to put the Rams up 6-0.
On the ensuing possession, the ball was turned over on downs after the Seahawks failed to complete a fake punt attempt. The Rams took over with great field position, and quickly struck again. Forni faked a hand-off and threw a strike to streaking receiver Michael Hill which resulted in a 25-yard touchdown, putting the Rams up to 14-0 at the end of the first quarter.
The offense wasn’t the only one having fun as the defense wasn’t allowing Cabrillo anything. Throughout the game, the Rams’ defense was making things uncomfortable for Seahawk quarterback Nick Wanner, constantly staying in his face when he would try to drop back for a pass.
“[W]e were flying around, did some nice things, but we need to clean it up when we face better competition,” said Rams’ safety Jarrell Harrison. “If we stick to what we’ve been coached we should be okay.”
In the second quarter, the Rams’ offense took over at their own 15 yard line. Cabrillo then put the Rams’ in little trouble by sacking Forni at his own 3-yard line. The quarterback threw a short pass to David Henderson, a running back out of San Francisco’s Lincoln High School.
Henderson produced a highlight that you rarely see outside of video games: Henderson seemed to be trapped on the left sideline, but stutter stepped and froze two Seahawk defenders, cutting all the way around to the right side of the field. As Henderson got to the right sideline with blockers in front of him, he put on his sprinting shoes to dart in front of the Cabrillo sideline and score an amazing 97-yard touchdown to give the Rams’ a 21-0 lead midway through the second quarter.
Cabrillo’s only points came during the third quarter when a Rams player kicked the ball out of bounds on a block punt. This lead to a penalty against the Rams and resulted in a safety for the Seahawks.