Trinity Knights football took its first loss of the season on Friday after a lopsided loss to the hosting Arleta Mustangs.
The Mustangs won the game, 49-8, behind a terrific game from sophomore Jose Rosas.
Rosas was a threat all over the field, as he led his team with 123 receiving yards, 121 rushing yards, three TDs, and seven tackles on defense.
Trinity head coach Mike Parrinello saw his young team fight hard in the loss.
“They’re a talented team,” Parrinello told the Signal in a phone interview. “They’re big, disciplined and I think they simply wanted it more than we did. We’re young and inexperienced and I don’t think we reacted to it very well, but we learned a lot from it. It taught us what we need to do when facing tough teams.”
Arleta (3-1) added scores in all three phases, running back a kickoff return for a touchdown and a pick-six on the pass-heavy Knights (2-1).
The Mustangs led 7-0 after the first quarter but posted two or more scores in each period to close out the game. Parrinello’s team was right there on so many plays but just didn’t execute on a handful of possessions.
“We were in a position to do a little better overall than we did but we didn’t execute,” Parrinello said. “We let them take over more than they should’ve. What really hurt us was we just gave up a few big plays.”
One big positive takeaway for the Knights was the emergence of junior Luke Backes. The receiver finished the night with a game-high 10 catches for 92 yards.
“We’re watching Luke Backes turn into a football player,” Parrinello said. “He’s a baseball player first but he’s really coming into his own. It was a really good bright spot for us.”
Knights quarterback Noah Visconti finished the game 25-for-38 with 241 passing yards, two picks and one passing TD to receiver Tyler Backman.
Trinity’s squad is one of Parrinello’s younger teams but the coach is proud of the maturation shown so far this season.
“I think they’re coming along really well,” Parrinello said. “Each game they’re coming along at an exponential rate that I’ve been happy with. You don’t wanna get blown out but we’re taking away some good game experience we need. We had some injuries last week so we had some newer players get a little more playing time and we might see that again this week. I’m excited to see how they mature and deal with a more significant role.”
The Knights’ defense gave up more points than they’d like to have but had some highlights with a fumble recovery, an interception from freshman Maddox Rice and a 15-tackle night from junior John Carlson.
Arleta will now head into East Valley League play with a road matchup at Verdugo Hills on Friday at 7 p.m.
The Knights will get one more non-league battle and head to Ojai to take on the Nordhoff Rangers on Friday.
Parrinello hopes to see his team respond well to another tough team but also get back to simple things.
“We’re just looking to get back to our basics and what we do well,” Parrinello said. “We have to put a game like that behind us. We can’t change what happened and have to look forward to the future. We’re installing some new things this week, which is typical for us throughout the season. In reality, it’s exciting. When you lose like that, you want to get back on the field and play again and be the team we think we can be.”
Trinity takes on Nordhoff Friday at 7 p.m.
