Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Portales posts third shutout of season, tops Moriarty
Matt King scoops up a fumble on the opening drive in Friday's District 3/4-4A game at Greyhound Stadium. The Rams won their fourth-straight, topping Moriarty 46-0.
Moriarty senior Caleb Fleming gets a solid grip on the jersey of Portales quarterback Julian Urioste, but Urioste still managed to break the tackle attempt.
PORTALES — Conventional football wisdom says keeping your defense on the field most of the game is bad — crossing the streams bad.
Portales football wisdom says give the defense a lead, and trust it to handle the rest.
It’s paying off for the Rams so far, with Friday’s 46-0 victory over Moriarty just another shovel on the mountain of evidence Portales is peaking as the season is reaching its end.
Friday’s win, which put the Rams at 6-3 overall and 2-0 in District 3/4-4A play, is just the latest chapter in a four-game winning streak where Portales has outscored its foes 196-21.
Plenty of credit goes to the Rams’ quick-strike offense, which possessed the ball for just 5:51 in a first half where it scored 33 points.
But it’s difficult to overlook a defense that ends up on the field three-fourths of the time and still posts a goose egg.
“Our defense has played great all year,” Portales coach Jaime Ramirez said. “At times we’ll bend, but for the most part our defense has stepped up and got stops.”
Case in point, Friday’s opening possession at Greyhound Stadium for the visiting Pintos. Behind a misdirection running game, the Moriarty trio of Xavier Romero, Santiago Montoya and Pedro Sandoval got to just outside the red zone on a 10-play drive before Matt King scooped up a Montoya fumble at the 23.
The Ram offense responded with a seven-play, 77-yard drive that D.J. Martinez punched in from 1 yard out.
“We were not playing well technique-wise, and our linebackers weren’t filling in the gaps,” Ramirez said of that first drive. “True to form, our defense was able to get a turnover.”
From there, Portales’ defense handled the Pintos (3-6, 0-2). Moriarty managed 58 yards and four first downs on the opening drive. The rest of the game, it posted 146 yards and 10 first downs and only crossed midfield once.
“I thought we had a solid start running the ball, then we just shot ourselves in the foot,” Moriarty coach Joseph Anaya said. “They’re a good football team, and with what we were able to do early I was happy. I wish we could have done that the rest of the night. They made good adjustments.”
Junior defensive tackle JJ Lujan said a shutout is nice, but not necessarily the goal above all else.
“Second quarter, we started filling our gaps right,” Lujan said. “When we came out at halftime, we knew we just had to do something. We’re just trying to work as hard as we can. It’s not about the points, it’s about how hard you work.”
The offense did its work, too, with senior quarterback Julian Urioste rushing for 119 yards and touchdowns of 66 and 18 yards. He also threw touchdown passes to Jayden Killette for 21 yards and Kellan Hightower for 37 yards in the second quarter and 8 yards to Jalen Allen in the third quarter for a 40-0 lead and the running clock.
Portales closed out the scoring early in the fourth on sophomore Baylor Diaz’ 56-yard run.
Portales heads to Lovington Friday night, with the winner taking the 3/4-4A title. The Wildcats also improved to 2-0 in district play with a 21-14 win at Ruidoso.
