El Camino wins 3rd straight football game, best winning streak since 2011

“Belief, I think that’s the main thing,” Colts head coach Rustin Mayorga said. “Just belief, work ethic, putting our best foot forward every day in practice. It’s just simple things. That’s all it is. We have our bread-and-butter plays and we just execute them at a high level. We just hold everybody accountable.”

And what better title for the mystical football noir setting than “Rustin Magic,” as in the magic being worked by Mayorga and his ambitious coaching staff. The Colts, behind first-year offensive coordinator Charles Truong, implemented a spread option offense this season.

It worked to perfection in wearing down Fremont’s defense. Make no mistake, though. The star of the show was Arenas, who rushed for three touchdowns and returned a 92-yard kickoff for another.

“He was an absolute workhorse,” Mayorga said. “He was lights out today. He played hard, he got to the outside. He can beat teams with speed but he’s also not afraid to lower his shoulder pads and do some dirty work.”

The first three quarters were a spirited back and forth before El Camino got some separation in the fourth. The lead changed four times in the game, with Arenas giving the Colts the edge on the scoreboard three different times.

His second score late in the first quarter gave El Camino a 13-7 advantage when he broke the longest kickoff return of his varsity career. The drifting fog set the stage as the low visibility made it difficult for the senior to see the deep tumbling kickoff, causing it to bounce inside the 10. Once he found it though, Arenas was off to the races.

“Kick return, you can’t see the ball,” Arenas said. “He kicks it to the 10, it bounces a couple yards. I pick it up about the middle of the field, take it far right, broke two or three tackles … 92-yard touchdown — take the lead.”

El Camino had to take the lead back again late in the first half on a 44-yard scoring pass from Gabe Rocha to senior Jeffrey Gamboa. But with just seconds remaining in the half, Fremont took the lead back when junior Don Martinez broke a kickoff return of his own, sending the Firebirds into halftime with a 21-20 lead.

But in the second half, Fremont just couldn’t get its defense off the field.

“We just couldn’t stop their offense,” Fremont head coach Rob Swartz said. “That was the major thing.”

El Camino sustained a long drive to open the second half with Arenas eating up most of the yards on the ground. He then broke a 20-yard scoring run around the right side to give the Colts the lead for good 26-21.

Fremont (1-2, 3-2) got closer when Martinez booted a 28-yard field goal with 2:03 to play in the third quarter, cutting El Camino’s lead to 26-24.

“We were trying to keep it close there instead of going for it,” Swartz said. “And I felt like we were moving the ball down here a little bit on our last drive. But we only had the ball I think two times in the second half. That’s been the story of the last two games, we can’t get off the field. So, that was really the tale of the game.”

The Colts took over at their own 41-yard line and went to work again, highlighted by third-down pickups from Arenas with runs of 15 and 5 yards before tabbing his third rushing score with a 3-yard touchdown with 9:14 to play.

Arenas, who transferred to El Camino following his sophomore year at Riordan, is in his first year of varsity football with the Colts. He’s proven a solid one-two punch with Rocha, who has taken over at quarterback due to an injury to the Colts’ first-string QB, senior Gio Carrara.

Carrara suffered a shoulder separation Saturday, Sept. 10 in El Camino’s first win of the current three-game streak 33-26 at Lincoln-SF. Rocha has taken his first two starts as a varsity quarterback in Carrara’s absence, though Rocha has seen plenty of playing time this season as the Colts’ Swiss Army knife.

“Gabe is pretty much the same exact player,” Mayorga said. “We were just fortunate enough to have him be our quarterback when Gio went down, and he’s been holding it down for us.”

The Colts are now one of just two teams with undefeated league records in the Peninsula Athletic League Lake Division, along with Woodside (3-0, 3-2).

“We’re going to get back in that locker room, turn up with my bros, we’re going to have some … fun,” Arenas said. “And we’re going to be back Monday to go for that four-game win streak.”