The Lions rolled to another Blossom Valley Athletic League Santa Teresa Division football victory last Friday night, cruising to a 60-28 thrashing of Mt. Pleasant to keep pace in the division race with Santa Teresa. The Lions are Lincoln 2-0 in the division, 5-0 for the year, and the Saints are 3-0 in league play.

The Lions offensive machine was almost unstoppable against the Cardinals. There were no big explosions but simply a consistent grinding out of yardage both on the ground and through the air. The Lions did not punt once all night long.

"They had trouble stopping us," said Collins. "But we fumbled once deep in their territory to stop ourselves."

"Our offensive line was opening up huge holes and our timing was very nice," added the coach.

The Lions piled up 524 yards in total offense including 436 yards on the ground. Senior running back Raul Figueroa must have slept well after racking up 210 yards on 19 carries while snagging three passes for another 54 yards. Figueroa powered in for two touchdowns on the ground with a 10- and 12-yard run. He also pulled down touchdown tosses of 27 and 15 yards from sophomore quarterback Tarik Hakmi.

Senior fullback Jason Silva got the pigskin only 10 times but he made the most of his chances. He blasted his way up the middle for 72 yards and four touchdowns. Silva hit paydirt on a 1-yard, a 3-yard blast and two 8-yard jaunts. He also tacked on a two-point conversion.

In only his second week back from an injury, junior Jose Ramirez showed his value to the offensive production, pounding out 107 yards on only eight efforts, including a 20-yard touchdown scamper. Hakmi did his part to balance out the offensive attack, connecting on 5 of 7 attempts for 88 yards and the two touchdowns to Figueroa. Kicker Chris Garcia had a busy night, converting on four of seven PAT attempts.

While the offense was rolling up the points, the Lions defense did its part to throttle the Cardinals efforts. Linebackers Patrick Yanez and Justin Weise made life miserable for opposing runners, nailing 16 and 14 tackles, respectively. They got excellent support from fellow linebackers Jacob DeLeon and Nicholas Pretty, who pulled down 13 and 9 tackles. Both Yanez and Weise also racked up a sack.

The only real negative coming out of the game was that sophomore tight end Chris Mendoza banged up his knee and may be out for a while.

The Lions hope to keep that engine running at top speed when they host Andrew Hill in another Santa Teresa Division contest on Oct. 23, 1:30 p.m.

Girls volleyball

With the first round of West Valley Division competition completed and round two under way, the Lincoln girls volleyball team has established itself as the team to beat in the championship race. The Lions banged out wins over San Jose and Yerba Buena last week to keep their league mark unblemished at 7-0 and improve overall to 10-3.

"Against San Jose, we made a lot of hitting mistakes and weren't having our best day, but we pulled through," head coach Hanah Kim said. "We served tough and played good defense." Alex Scoffone nailed seven kills to lead the Lions to the 25-16, 25-14, 26-24 win over San Jose.

Later in the week, Lincoln came back strong with a solid match against Yerba Buena to claim another 3-0 win 25-14, 25-11, 25-16. It was Scoffone leading the way again, hammering down 12 kills, but she got plenty of support from several teammates. Amber Bruning went high to ring down seven kills while Kirsten Anderson and Mallory Owens powered six each.

"All of my main hitters did well and Romana Cruz saved some sets by getting the ball in the court and hitting smart," Kim said. "Our setter did a great job moving the ball around."

The Lions played solid defense as well with both Jessica Ortiz and Tarah Herning coming up with a "bunch of important digs." Kim also pointed out some key off the bench play by Anika Armstrong and Tiffany Clark, who "came off the bench and gave us a boost." Armstrong blasted three kills and Clark picked up four digs.

The Lions travel to Pioneer on Oct. 21 for an important contest. Pioneer is currently in second place with a 5-2 division mark and nipping at the heels of the Lions.

Boys water polo

Nate Tenboer and Ian Siersema made sure that Lincoln held on to its Santa Teresa Division lead in boys water polo last week when the Lions visited Willow Glen. Tenboer fired in five goals and Siersema added four to lead Lincoln to a 14-6 win. The Lions kept their undefeated league record intact at 5-0 and dropped the Rams to 4-2.

It was a closely contested battle with the score knotted at 1-1 after one period of play but the Lions outscored the Rams 6-1 in the second period to enjoy a 7-2 lead at halftime. Willow Glen came charging back to keep it close at 9-6 after three periods but Lincoln showed its strength, netting five unanswered goals in the fourth to pull away for the win.

The Lincoln scoring was rounded out with Aaron Gomez, Mike Patton, Colin Lindsay, Braden Gough and John Wilhelm netting one goal each.

In girls water polo, the Lions dropped to 0-5 in Mt. Hamilton Division play with an 11-6 loss to Santa Teresa.

Katie Silva powered in three goals to lead the Lions. Laina Reginelli, Kelly Hendrickson and Ariane Black each added one.