By Matthew Robinson
PANORAMA CITY – Thursday’s contest between the Panorama Pythons and the Fulton Prep Jaguars was projected to be a competitive game between two 2-0 teams; instead, the game was pretty much over by halftime. Four touchdown runs by Pythons junior running back Brandon Hernandez Villa gave the home team a 38-12 halftime lead, and in the second half the Pythons added to their lead while keeping a scrappy Jaguars team out of the end zone en route to a 52-12 victory.
The Pythons (3-0) bludgeoned the Jaguars for 434 yards rushing on 20 carries and 7 scoring runs out of their Flexbone offense, an extremely run-heavy offense. A quarterback has to sacrifice glory and his body to succeed in the Flexbone, and junior quarterbacks Sebastian De Alba-Medina (3 carries for 13 yards) and Jacob Garcia (3 carries for 29 yards) fit the offense to a tee athletically and personality-wise. The black and gold attempted only one pass during the game: a 34-yarder to senior running back Angelo Garcia from De Alba-Medina, which ended the first half.
Hernandez Villa is one of the most explosive offensive players in the Los Angeles City Section, and he showed why on Thursday. The talented running back carried the ball 12 times for 252 yards and 5 touchdown runs versus the Jaguars. He had 5 carries for 172 yards and 2 scores by the end of the first quarter and 206 yards rushing by halftime. In the second half, he was only called on twice for 46 yards and 1 score for obvious reasons. He may be the best running back Panorama Head Coach Adrian Beltran has ever had in his fourteen years as the head coach at the school, and that’s saying something because the school has had some good ones such as Sean Munsch (2021), Kurt Urrutia (2021), and the second-best running back Beltran ever coached, Melvin Linares (2022).
Beltran is appreciative of Hernandez Villa’s talent as well as the work that the offensive line has put into these last three games.
“It’s always easy as a head coach when you have a good player like Brandon Hernandez [Villa] and his [offensive] linemen,” Beltran pointed out. “He’s a D1 [the highest level of college football] athlete; his name needs to be known.”
Hernandez Villa, like any talented and humble running back, knows that his bread is buttered (yards, touchdowns, open holes to run through) by the offensive line that blocks for him every week. And that offensive line consists of senior offensive tackles Miguel Garcia and Justin Barrera, senior center Matthew Savadjian, junior offensive guards Jason Melgar and Cesar Olivarria.
“First of all, I got to give thanks to my coaches and my o-line [offensive line]; without that o-line, I’m nothing,” Hernandez Villa explained. “They [offensive line] put in the work every day in practice; they’re out there every day striving in the heat, I’m thankful for them.”
Hernandez Villa also had help from his fellow talented running backs, junior Mario Victoria (4 carries for 70 yards) and senior Isaac Mendoza (5 carries for 41 yards and 1 score). When Hernandez Villa wasn’t in the game, the Jaguars had to put up with the high-stepping and physical running styles of Victoria and Mendoza, who would be starters for other teams in the Valley Mission League. Mendoza also plays inside linebacker on defense and his versatility on both sides of the ball has drawn praise from his head coach.
“Isaac Mendoza is a utility belt; he does a little bit of everything,” Beltran said. “We use him everywhere, at linebacker, fullback, tight end, and running back. He’s a great complementary player to Brandon.”
One of the interesting themes of the week leading up to the Pythons’ matchup against the Jaguars was that the former was in the dark about who or what the Jaguars are as an offensive and defensive team thus far this season, and Beltran made a mental note of that mystery.
“We didn’t get film for them [Fulton Prep]; we didn’t really know what was going on; we just knew they were 2-0,” Beltran disclosed.
The Pythons found out early in the game who stirs the Jaguars’ (2-1) drink, and it was senior quarterback Ethan Ramos who went 14 for 31 for 131 yards, 2 touchdown passes and 1 interception. And when the Pythons took care of him by shutting down his passing lanes and putting more pressure on him, the visiting Jaguars were done. The Jaguars have some solid receivers who will definitely give their future 2026 opponents fits, but today they were held in check with tight and bothersome (for the Jaguars, that is) coverage from Python defenders.
On defense, the Pythons were led by guess who? Hernandez Villa. He led the team with 8 tackles, 4 tackles for loss, and 1 sack (minus 7 yards) from his inside linebacker post. Filling out the tackle sheet were Mendoza (3 tackles, 1 pass broken up), the aforementioned Miguel Garcia (2 tackles, .5 sack), linebacker Carlos Campos Suarez (2 tackles), defensive back Christopher Perez Granados (1 tackle, 1 interception), and backup quarterback and starting linebacker Jacob Garcia (4 tackles, 1 pass broken up).
The Pythons started off the game’s scoring when Hernandez Villa, on the first offensive play of the game, took the handoff from his quarterback and sped up the middle untouched for an 82-yard scoring run. Junior kicker/offensive lineman Ryan Calderon came in and took care of the point-after-touchdown kick, which gave the home team a 7-0 lead with 11:42 left in the first quarter.
Angelo Garcia moved the Pythons’ lead to 14-0 when he took off down the left side of the offensive line for a 29-yard unscathed touchdown run with 7:56 left in the first quarter.
Hernandez Villa scored his second touchdown of the game when he jogged into the end zone standing up for a 5-yard scoring run. He also scored on the two-point conversion run, which moved the Pythons’ lead to 22-0 with 4:48 left in the first quarter.
The Jaguars cut into the Pythons’ lead when Ramos threw the ball a little high in the air, where wide receiver Derra Reth snatched the ball against tight coverage. The extra point kick was good, and the score moved to 22-7 with 55.4 seconds left in the first quarter.
Early in the second quarter, Hernandez Villa added to his scoring total when he followed a pulling tackle’s block into the end zone for a 1-yard touchdown run. Mighty mite senior running back Chris Garcia Leon (5 feet 4 inches and 145 pounds) carried the ball into the end zone for the two-point conversion, which gave the Pythons a commanding 30-6 lead with 8:54 left in the second quarter.
Ramos was half responsible for the Jaguars’ last points of the game when he threw to a diving Iyobosa Aghahowa in the end zone. The extra point kick was no good, so the score stood at 30-12 with 5:36 remaining in the second quarter.
Hernandez Villa scored his second-to-last touchdown of the game when he got free on the left side of the offensive line for a 1-yard scoring run. He took care of the two-point conversion run, which gave the Pythons a 38-12 count with 3:45 left in the first half. The prolific running back scored his last touchdown of the game on a 15-yard run, which sent the score to 45-12 at the 2:40 mark of the second quarter.
A running clock was used at the start of the fourth quarter because of the Pythons’ game-long dominance of the scoreboard.
Mendoza scored his first touchdown of the game when he ran into the end zone from 4 yards out. Calderon connected on the extra point kick, which gave the game its final score of 52-12 with 11:49 left in the game.
The use of a running clock and a few kneel-downs by the Pythons offense helped end the game mercifully for the Jaguars.
Next Friday, September 11th, the Pythons will travel to El Camino Real High School to take on the Conquistadors for a 7:00 PM meeting. Fulton Prep will have a bye next week and then they will resume action on the road on Friday, September 18th, versus the Poly Parrots. Kickoff is at 7:00 PM.