The Wildcats have won their first Foothill League football game of the year, and second overall in the 2025 season.
On Friday night, West Ranch defeated Castaic at Valencia High School, 21-19, and now carries some late-season momentum into the final two games of the season.
“It was a hard-fought game. We’re definitely happy with the win,” West Ranch head coach TJ Yonkers said. “We got a lot of things to clean up on our end. Obviously a win is a win, and, in this league, it can get tough so we’re going to try to ride out some momentum here.”
As the season goes on, the team is getting healthier following multiple starters getting injured in the first half of the season.
One of the key names returning to a recovering offense is Aiden Lynch. He joins Charlie Samuelson among those who have made their return to the Wildcats offense in the last few weeks.
“Aiden Lynch was out for a couple weeks with some ankle injuries. We’ve got him back,” Yonkers said. “So, it’s good to see the guys kind of find some success and hopefully see what it looks like to do things the right way … Now that we’ve seen it and they’ve done it, we’re hoping we can kind of get build some muscle memory there.”
And with the reinforcements for West Ranch (2-6, 1-3), its offense put up the highest point total since the Wildcats’ last win in week two over Antelope Valley with 21 points.
Not only did the offense execute, but the defense did so too for West Ranch.
The Wildcats’ defense held Castaic at bay for most of the game and executed the most in the first half against the Coyotes’ (0-8, 0-4) offense.
“It was good to see. It was a good kind of uptick for us on the defensive side,” Yonkers said. “We changed a few things up to kind of give Castaic a different look. I think it worked well for us, especially in the first half.”
As for Castaic, the loss adds another defeat for the Coyotes, a team that has no wins in the season.
The 19-point score from Castaic’s offense was the best performance the Coyotes have turned in all season.
Now, the team will look to replicate that offense again but against tough competition with Saugus and Valencia in weeks nine and 10.
West Ranch plays at home next week hosting Golden Valley at Cougar Stadium.
