The start of the season Saturday couldn’t have gone worse for the GCC football team.

Glendale (0-1) continued to make the same mistakes that plagued the Vaqueros last season by committing 12 penalties for 106 yards and giving up 444 yards of total offense in their 54-17 loss Saturday to Pasadena City College.

“We met the enemy, and they were us,” said assistant coach and offensive coordinator John Rome. “We made more mistakes than what was acceptable.”

The Lancers (1-0), ranked 17th in the JC Athletic Bureau pre-season poll, and number 12 in the Southern California Regional poll, proved to be the more aggressive and more physical of the two teams. They out hit, and out hustled GCC all game long, and showed prowess from the first series of the game.

Jonathan Smith of PCC took the opening kickoff 50 yards down to the GCC 40-yard line. On its second play of the game, from the GCC 34-yard line, PCC quarterback Nathan Chandler ran over a GCC defender on the Pasadena sideline for an eight-yard gain, and a first down. Three plays later, Chandler threw a nine-yard touchdown pass to Jeremy Hartsfield.

Chandler went 18-for-26 195 yards, and had touchdown passes of 9,19, and 25 yards.

Like last season, GCC offense continued to be inconsistent. Along with the 12 penalties, quarterback Joseph Kroells threw two interceptions. Kroells went 10 for 22, 158 yards, with one touchdown pass, and the two interceptions. Of those yards, 125 went to Steve Carballo, who caught six passes.

Jeff Runnells took the first interception back for a 40-yard touchdown, and the second happened just before halftime when Olajuan Le Shore picked off Kroells in the end-zone.
The play that would have brought the score to 23-17. Instead, Glendale had to go into half time down 23-10.

By that time, there was nothing Glendale could do.

In the second half, the Lancers scored on all six of their possessions.

On Glendale’s first three possessions of the second half, they managed zero yards, while the Lancers scored on all five of their second-half possessions.

“From our offensive mistakes, to the illegal procedures, the jumping [offside] we did, to our personal fouls, to our inability to take, it was a combination on all phases,” said Rome.
Going into Saturday’s game at San Bernardino.

“We need to work in areas that were glaring mistakes, look at the film, and tell the player what the mistake was so he can learn.”