Escalon’s youngest football Cougars scored early and often against an over-matched Mountain House team on Thursday in Escalon.

Quarterback Dylan Parks capped a first quarter drive with a 1-yard plunge, and Kaidence Trejo got loose for a 26-yard touchdown sprint early in the second quarter. Bryan Hale’s 6-yard touchdown run and two-point conversion gave Escalon a 20-0 lead at halftime.

The Cougars continued the onslaught in the third quarter. Parks found Shane Johnson on an 18-yard touchdown pass on Escalon’s first drive of the half. Trejo followed again with a 4-yard score. Austin Terra scored on a 7-yard run to open the fourth quarter, and Wyatt McCune’s conversion pass was complete to Omar Algaheim to push the lead to 40-0. Mountain House scored late in the fourth to make the final score 40-8.

The freshman defense also came to life, shutting down the Mustangs’ offense by limiting them to only three first downs and one late score. The defensive linemen dominated Mountain House, allowing only one inside run of more than three yards. Linebackers Noah Rast and Bryan Hale shut down the outside run.

“Rast has really come on strong as the leader for our defense,” said Coach Danny King. “Our system requires the linebackers to do a lot of difficult things very well and very consistently. It’s a difficult process to learn, but Noah has become a truly dominant player at outside linebacker. Thursday’s game was a good example. All the guys were playing well, but Rast was at another level.”

The freshmen are off for Oct. 20 as Ripon has cancelled their freshman schedule. Escalon will close their season the following week with a rematch at Hughson.