As the high school football season continues, every team is looking to be the best team in their respective leagues. In week four, teams games in the transvalley league include, Sonora vs Turlock, Escalon vs Lodi, and Ripon Christian vs Mesa Verde. However, the RHS football team has their bye week, giving the players time to rest up for the rest of the season. This also allows both the players and fans a chance to look at the good and bad from the RHS football team’s start to the season.
The RHS football team is currently 3-0 after week 3 of the season. This is the team’s first 3-0 start since the 2019 season when they won the state championship. The team has played Golden Valley, Enochs, and Oakland high school in the three games they have played. In these games Ripon High has won with dominant performances. They beat Golden Valley 48-26, Enochs 64-28, and Oakland High 21-6.
Offensively the team has been superb, with the run game getting the team huge leads. This is all from Ripon High’s impressive backfield consisting of Juniors, Kael Rangel, Ace Dougherty, and Matthew Gaines. The team has been able to have a combined 750 total rush yards and 14 rushing touchdowns in the first three games of the season. This effective rushing attack allows for a more efficient passing game as Junior QB, Andrew Shaw, has had 391 passing yards, three touchdowns, and zero interceptions, to start the 2025 season.
Rangel stated on the rushing game,”I feel the greatest success we have right now is with our o-linemen. Shout out to Tip(Tipeti Paini),Walker(Walker Leamer), Lorezno(Lorenzo Hernandez), Alex(Alex Raudales), Swift(Wyatt Swift),all you guys. You guys do amazing. Our o-linemen are just great at blocking and they just put so many people on the floor, and it’s so easy for me to run. Couldn’t do it without them.”
Defensively, the team has not been able to rack up as impressive numbers, however they have still been an effective unit. The team’s defensive line has been formidable force against opposing teams as Ripon High has completely shut down opposing teams ground game. The team also has gotten three sacks on the year and 21 qb hurries. However, teams have been able to stay in games against RHS with their passing game. Ripon High’s secondary has struggled in the first few games of the season as they have allowed big Y.A.C(yards after catch) plays throughout the course of the season. Ripon High’s offense has been able to generate big leads to keep the team out of danger of losing, however the secondary is going to need to improve if they are to continue this impressive win streak.
Rangel stated on the secondary concerns,”I trust my team 100%. It could be from anything, I trust them no matter what. All of them are putting in a lot of work on the practice field every single day. I believe and trust in my team 100%.”
With league games officially beginning on Sep 19 2025, the RHS football team will go up against more difficult opponents than they have faced at the start of the season. So everyone will be watching to see if Ripon High’s incredible start was a sign of good things from the football team, or just a mirage of this team’s potential.
