Eldorado deals Cats 50-14 loss

ALBUQUERQUE — It certainly wasn’t the way the Clovis High football team wanted to end the regular season.

Starting from the opening kickoff, which Eldorado senior Shane Aspera returned 85 yards for the first of his three touchdowns, the Wildcats found themselves buried in a deep hole by the end of the first quarter.

They never recovered, losing to the Eagles 50-14 in the Class 6A District 2/5 and regular-season finale for both squads.

While Eldorado (7-3, 4-1 district) is squarely in the 12-team Class 6A playoff picture, the Cats (3-6, 3-3) finished fourth in the district. Still, Clovis coach Cal Fullerton said his squad held out a glimmer of hope that they could squeeze in, depending on the outcome of other games this weekend.

“The bad thing is we left it up to somebody else,” he said.

After the opening kickoff return, the Eagles ran a successful onside kick and quickly scored again. Eldorado led 22-0 barely halfway through the opening quarter, and 29-7 by the end of the stanza.

“We were down 22-0, and we had only run one play from scrimmage,” Fullerton said. “You can’t do that against a good football team.”

The Cats got both of their tallies on pass plays covering 94 and 51 yards from senior quarterback Milo Acosta to junior receiver R.J. Nora, who had four catches overall for 163 yards. Meantime, Acosta garnered 208 yards passing on 9-of-16, but he was sacked three times for losses totaling 33 yards.

“(Nora) played very well,” Fullerton said. “When we had time to get the ball off, our passing game wasn’t too bad. We weren’t able to run it at all.”

Aspera also scored on an 11-yard pass from senior quarterback Elias Franco and on a 1-yard run. Franco finished 6-of-10 passing for 109 yards, with additional scoring tosses of 16 yards to sophomore Josiah Mitchell in the first period and 14 yards to senior Alesandro Morrison in the third.

“We just made too many mistakes (to be competitive),” Fullerton said.

Aspara caught two passes for 42 yards and added 20 yards on the ground. Senior running back Aidan St. John carried 21 times for 111 yards and scored on a 1-yard run in the opening canto.

All games were to be completed by 4 p.m. on Saturday, and the New Mexico Activities Association was scheduled to finalize playoff pairings late in the evening.