近距离内射合集

RIO RANCHO 鈥� After losing a number of key skill position players to graduation from last year鈥檚 Class 6A runner-up, Las Cruces head coach Mark Lopez knew his team was going to have to lean on its defense early in 2026.

That played out exactly as expected on Friday night, as the Bulldawgs forced three turnovers and got a pair of rushing touchdowns from new starting quarterback Aldo Gallegos to edge Rio Rancho 14-7 on the Rams鈥� home field.

鈥淲e knew early on in the season that our defense was going to need to carry us,鈥� Lopez said. 鈥淲e were wanting to obviously be a little bit more efficient offensively. The game kind of played out how we were anticipating, other than us being able to kind of finish drives and stuff. I think if you finish kind of the two drives that you have inside the 20, it's a 28-7 game, and it's a little bit more comfortable.

鈥淣ow we have an opportunity to learn through success.鈥�

The Bulldawgs鈥� defense set the tone on the first play from scrimmage. After a short completion by Rio Rancho deep in its own territory, Lukas Nanez forced a fumble, and fellow defensive back Alex Guerra recovered the ball on the Rio Rancho 4. Two plays later, Gallegos darted into the end zone from seven yards out to give his team a lead less than a minute into the game.

鈥淥ur defense set us up amazing. I knew I had to capitalize off that,鈥� Gallegos said. 鈥溾��We set the tone.鈥�

The Las Cruces defense provided another short field in the second quarter when Jeremiah Morales picked off an errant pass from Rams senior quarterback Micah Takahashi. That gave the Bulldawgs the ball at the Rio Rancho 38 and seven plays later, Gallegos scored from one yard out to give his team a 14-0 edge with 5:07 to play in the first half.

At that point, Rio Rancho had failed to generate any offense of note, and it appeared that Las Cruces might be able to cruise to victory. However, momentum shifted on the Rams鈥� first possession of the second half. On a 66-yard scoring drive, Takahashi completed a pair of passes to Gilly Terrazas for 22 combined yards before finding paydirt himself on a 34-yard jaunt. At that point it was 14-7 Bulldawgs with 9:31 to play in the third, and it seemed like a very different ball game.

The Rams threatened on their next drive, but turned the ball over on downs despite having a 2nd-and-1 on the Las Cruces 31. That turned out to be their last serious scoring opportunity, as Las Cruces got an interception from Guerra and forced another turnover on downs in the waning moments of the second half.

鈥淲e just kind of made game-time adjustments,鈥� Lopez said. 鈥溾��We played off a little bit too much on a couple of passes, and then we kind of tightened that up.鈥�

While the Las Cruces offense couldn鈥檛 add to its lead 鈥� it missed a 39-yard field goal with 6:56 to play 鈥� Gallegos helped to drain the clock with a couple of key runs down the stretch. He finished with 76 of his 107 rushing yards in the second half.

The Bulldawgs will still have to figure out how to replace the prolific trio of quarterback Gunnar Guardiola, tailback Danny Amaro and receiver Francisco Winnikoff going forward, but for now, the new guys are happy to earn a season-opening win in hostile territory.

鈥淓veryone doubted us, and we knew what we had,鈥� Gallegos said. 鈥淲e knew we lost a lot, but we also had a lot coming up, so we didn't really worry about that. We put everyone on silent and just did our thing.鈥�