Held at a season low of 13 points in the first half, Pebble Hills came out the second and torched the Chapin Huskies with 21 points en route to a 34-14 win on the road Friday night Sept. 14. 

Junior quarterback Sebastian Ochoa, who threw for four touchdowns,  has continued to perform like a seasoned veteran for the Spartans and has yet to turn the ball over in his first three starts. The feat is even more impressive as Ochoa scrambles out of the pocket on occasion and gets into collisions that would jar the ball open from most.

Pebble Hills head coach Mark Torres feels that as good as Ochoa has played, there is room for improvement as the season inches closer to district play.

“He’s a tough kid, he’s letting the game come to him, he missed a couple throws in the fourth quarter early that were right there that’s something when we play some of the better teams in our division, you know we’re going to have to connect on,” Torres said.

Ochoa managed to hit all of his four receivers for touchdowns, Noah Mendoza, Devean Deal, Isaiah Davis, and Arturo Salazar.

“Those guys work really hard all week to do the things they could do,” Ochoa said. “People don’t think that we have the skills and the talent to do what we do, but it shows on Fridays and Thursdays.”

Pebble Hills’ brick wall-like defense in the second half was vital in Friday night’s win against Chapin, as they managed to keep the Huskies to only one touchdown per half.

“Chapin’s a good team, I thought we executed well up until the point in the first half, where they stopped us a few times, and credit to them for that but we kept our heads up,” Torres said. “We gave up one play defensively in the second half, it was a big one but we executed very well.”

This was more than just another win for head coach Torres, who was a former player and coach for Tony Shaw’s Irvin Rockets.

“Well, first of all, this stadium is special to me,” Torres said. “I graduated from high school here, I played for Tony Shaw, I love playing here, so number one, that’s important and I’m happy about that.”

Photos by Hannah Aguilar

Friday night’s game was the week’s Game of the Week and the added pressure did not seem to phase the Spartans on their way to their third win in three games this season.

“We don’t really care about that,” Ochoa said. “We go in every day and practice as hard as we can, we go out and play as hard as we can, and we just go out and let the results show.”

Next Friday Pebble Hills will be traveling out of El Paso to take out the San Angelo Bobcats, a team that the Spartans lost to in the playoffs last year. The Bobcats are 2-1 on the season.

“We just got to play within ourselves, if we start thinking about, ‘it’s San Angelo, it’s someone we lost to in the playoffs,  then you know, bad things could happen so it’s just a matter of taking care of what we can control,” Torres said.

For the second time in program history, the Spartans are 3-0 on the season and much of their success has to be attributed to their explosive offense.