After making the long trek to Weed, the Chabot football team suffered its first defeat of the season, falling 23-20 to Siskiyous on Saturday, Sept. 22.
Chabot linebacker Devon Vaenuku clearly travels well. He had a monster game with 16 tackles (8 solo).
Freshman quarterback Chayce Akaka ran 17 times for 96 yards and two touchdowns, also completing 16 of 32 attempts for 120 yards passing.
Chabot (3-1) will look to rebound strongly against West Hills-Coalinga (2-2) at 6 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 29 at Gladiator Stadium.
Before the tough loss, the Gladiators opened the season reeling off wins over Shasta, 27-7, Sequoias, 34-20, and San Joaquin Delta, 45-0, averaging 35.3 points a game.
After trailing Siskiyous 6-0 early, Akaka scored on touchdown runs of 8 yards and 13 yards to put Chabot ahead 13-6. But Siskiyous (1-3) retook the lead 16-13 in the back-and-forth battle. With 6:57 left in the third quarter, Ja'Juan Johnson completed a 9-yard TD pass toTraveon Auzenne, and Chabot led 20-16 after Alejandro Cervantes' extra point. But Siskiyous went ahead for good on a 41-yard TD run by Andrew Kannely- Robles (137 yards, 27 attempts).
In other defensive highlights, Samuele Cavallini and Eric Tafeamalii both had quarterback sacks. Lapitu Mahoni and Le-Anthony Grey both were in on nine tackles.
West Hills (2-2) lost to Laney (4-0) 77-12 last week but does own wins over DVC, 35-29, and Shasta, 40-20.
After a bye next week, Chabot will host DVC in its Bay 6 opener on Oct 13.