Long Beach City College quarterback Derrach West aired out 254 yards on 21 completions for the No.19 Vikings to defeat the No.10 Cerritos Falcons 36-24 Sat. night for their first home win of the season.
The Viking offense played with a chip on their shoulders gaining a total of 368 yards to the Falcon’s 250.
The offense wasn’t the only unit that was clicking, the defense had itself a game as well, not allowing a Falcon touchdown until the last five minutes of the game.
The big momentum shift in the game was in the second quarter when the Viking offense put together a 13 play 65 yard drive to score a touchdown and take back the lead up 12-11 before halftime.
With a score of 12-11 at halftime for the Vikings, Long Beach City College didn’t really start to expand their lead until they cleaned up the penalties.
The Vikings committed nine penalties giving the Falcons 84 yards which kept them in the game, as well as their consistent field goals.
“Too many penalties, that’s kind of been our issue, once we’re in rhythm, we play really well, the penalties is obviously a major concern,” Head Coach Brett Peabody said.
Coming out of halftime, the Vikings offense picked up right where they left off going 5 plays for 75 yards including a 29 yard run by running back Jonathan Watson into the endzone all in less than 2 minutes.
At the end of the game the Vikings have up one touchdown to the Vikings, with 37 seconds left on the clock.
“We played good, obviously we could’ve played 10 times better, I think we should’ve gave up no points at the end, but you know that’s on us,” Linebacker DeAnthony Jones said.
Quarterback Derrach West believes the team has the potential to do better than they did Saturday night.
“We performed great but that’s not our best we could be much more crisp, we still need to pick it up a little bit, mental errors nothing physical really,” West said.
The Vikings will have a bye week and return to host East Los Angeles College on October 9.