WEEK ZERO FOOTBALL – Valley Christian’s defense, quarterback Graham Lunzer headline rout of Gahr

Valley Christian senior wide receiver gets away from Gahr High sophomore cornerback De’Mir Cunningham for a 60-yard touchdown reception from junior quarterback Graham Lunzer on the third play of the second quarter last Friday night. V.C. would post a 41-0 romp over the Gladiators in the season opener for both teams. PHOTO BY STEVE FERICEAN.

August 27, 2025

By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X

This was not the same Gahr High football team that advanced to the 2024 CIF-Southern Section Division 13 championship game. This was also not the same Valley Christian High squad that fell a game short of advancing to the Division 9 playoffs last season.

In last Friday’s season opener, it was all about the V.C. defense, junior quarterback Graham Lunzer, a transfer from St. John Bosco High, and the plethora of receivers the Defenders have. Put all that together and it was a dominating 41-0 win that was much closer in the first half. But if you ask V.C. head coach Brendan Chambers or longtime Gahr head coach Greg Marshall, the score was not what they had expected.

“Absolutely not,” said Chambers. I just went to [senior linebacker] Cole Hefner and I told him I thought we would win, but I didn’t think it would be like this. But this was just a great effort; we knew the defense…that’s the strength of our team. At halftime, I put it to them. They had to get a stop and then we had to go score and the offense came out and played pretty well. Both quarterbacks played well; threw the ball around and the offensive line protected them. It was just a great team win.”

“I didn’t see that coming, and actually they were better than I thought,” said Marshall. “They were flying around; they played harder than we did.”

After an unsuccessful onside kick to begin the game, it didn’t take Lunzer long to make his presence known as a V.C. Defender. On the second play, he picked up 10 yards on first down from the Gahr 21-yard line, and four plays after that, he scored from three yards out for the first touchdown of the game.

“Oh man, you have no idea,” said Lunzer of his emotions of the first touchdown of the season. “Going from being a backup and watching guys do it to doing it myself and having the student body and fans behind you cheering for you feels great. It was just electric, and I got to celebrate with the guys.”

Then three plays into the second quarter, Lunzer found an open Oliver Boateng and the senior wide receiver matriculated down the field for a 60-yard touchdown. The score would stay at 13-0 heading into halftime, but Lunzer was already having a stellar first half, completing four of seven passes for 96 yards and rushing three times for 17 yards.

“It was great; getting out there with the team for the first time,” said Lunzer. “It was a new environment, great fans and the O-line played well. The receivers held down their jobs and we got it done.”

Lunzer credited Chambers for the call on the touchdown, citing his ‘great football knowledge’.

“Every time we ran three by one, we saw them going one on one on the backside press,” he added. “We knew we had to match up Oliver, obviously a great receiver. We knew before the play, I saw him one on one, called a fade to him and the rest is history.”

If the game ended without the second half being played, the numbers still would have been staggering. The Defenders ran 30 plays in the first half, gaining 217 yards and holding the ball for over 13 and a half minutes. Meanwhile, Gahr’s offense was nearly stagnant because of the suffocating defense.

Gahr senior quarterback Roman Acosta managed to complete six passes in the half for 41 yards but on the ground, the Gladiators picked up five yards on eight carries. On top of that, Hefner sacked Acosta for a five-yard loss late in the first quarter and two plays later, senior safety Sean Bouma picked off Acosta on third and 23. The turnover led to the second score of the contest.

Valley Christian High senior Cole Hefner catches one of his two receptions late in the second quarter as Gahr High sophomore linebacker Miguel Lopez gives chase in last Friday’s 41-0 season-opening victory. PHOTO BY STEVE FERICEAN.

“We just knew defensively that the first drive was going to be the most important one,” said Chambers. “If we could stop them and get the ball on offense and go down and score, we could kind of put them away a little bit.”

Something else that V.C. was experimenting with in the game was rotating Lunzer and junior quarterback Liam Sweeney, who completed six of 10 passes for 128 yards and a 69-yard touchdown pass to junior wide receiver Byron Louis late in the game for the final points.

“I think last week in our scrimmage, we had both quarterbacks kind of battling for [the starting spot],” said Chambers. “We kind of went with Graham first and I told him to give me a reason to not take you off the field. He definitely gave me a reason not to take him off the field. We mixed in Liam a little bit; he did well, too. But it was just a gritty performance by [Lunzer]. I was really impressed with what he’s able to do.”

“All summer throughout practice, I was told it was going to be fair, and I love that,” said Lunzer on the competition with Sweeney. “We went to seven on seven’s about equal, went into the scrimmage about equal and came out of the scrimmage equal. So, this [past] week in practice, we battled it out and was told today right before the game that I was going to get the first three drives. It was pretty last minute.”

Lunzer didn’t miss a beat in the second half, connecting with Bouma on a 42-yard score on the second play of V.C.’s first drive post halftime. Then when the Defenders got the ball back, he orchestrated an 11-play, 58-yard drive that took nearly seven minutes off the clock. It ended with a 12-yard touchdown pass to senior wide receiver Dylan Teays. Lunzer would complete only six passes in 11 attempts but threw for 168 yards in his debut. He and Sweeney targeted half a dozen players and all but one of them caught at least two passes. Louis and Teays each caught three for 92 and 27 yards, respectively. On the ground, senior running back Lucas Witt led the charge with 46 yards on a dozen touches.

“We knew that going into the season offensively, our strength was going to be our receivers,” said Chambers. “And [Witt] at running back, just being a bruiser…we know we have guys at the skill position right now that can catch the football and make people miss after they catch. So, it was a great job by the receivers.”

“I don’t know how [opponents] are going to stop [the offense] to be honest,” said Lunzer. “We’ve got so many athletes at this school and it’s just going to be great all year seeing how guys develop. And even the younger guys; we’ve got guys on [junior varsity] and freshman balling out down there too. We’ve just got tons of talent here.”

Defensively, Hefner had 10 tackles, three of them for losses, and the sack while Boateng added five sacks. Up until the last drive of the game, Gahr was held to 15 rushes with six going for negative yardage. Acosta, who was 14 of 24 for 93 yards, had the team’s longest gain on the ground of 11 yards, which came early in the fourth quarter.

In contrast, of the 29 rushes V.C. had, 12 went for at least five yards and of the 13 completed passes, nine went for double digit yardage.

“I think they were a better football team, but we gave up a long pass, another long pass and we didn’t tackle in the open field,” said Marshall. “If the secondary played better and just tackle, it wouldn’t have gotten upside down like that.”

“Talk about taking pressure off my back,” said Lunzer. “When the other team can’t score any points at all…we’re going out there, letting them hang loose and just kind of taking shots. Yeah, the defense held theirs today.”

V.C. posted its 18^th shutout since 1999 with a 56-0 win over Godinez High on Oct. 10, 2008 being the widest margin while this was the worst shutout for Gahr since a 58-0 pasting by Paramount High on Nov. 1, 2019. Since 1999, the Gladiators have been blanked 29 times.

Gahr will host another city rival, Cerritos High, on Friday while V.C. will stay home to entertain Calvary Chapel Santa Ana High.