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October 6, 2025
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
On the week of its home game against Bellflower High in the Mid-Cities League opener, Gahr High head coach Greg Marshall celebrated his birthday and three days later, his team gave him one of the biggest gifts he could have asked for. Sparked by a rare flurry of first quarter points, the Gladiators got back at the Buccaneers for the past two meetings of frustration.
Gahr scored 21 points in the first 7:26 of the contest, including sophomore De’Mir Cunningham’s 94-yard kickoff return to open the game as the hosts had no problems with the Buccaneers in a 48-13 rout last Friday at Dr. Hanford Rants Stadium.
Bellflower defeated Gahr 40-20 in 2022 and 44-21 in 2023, then lost all 10 games last season as it was in the Gateway League. As a result of the 0-10 season, the Buccaneers were brought back to the Mid-Cities League and entered the league opener with a 4-1 mark.
“That’s what happened; we got the kickoff, we got the onside kick, we scored, and before you know it, [Bellflower] was like, uh, oh,” said Marshall of the first few minutes. “It’s hard to come back from that.”
After Cunningham’s return, freshman James Carter recovered an onside kick from sophomore Matthew Barcelos at the Bellflower 32-yard line and four plays later, senior quarterback Roman Acosta saw an opening on the right side and raced for a 30-yard touchdown run.
‘The line is good; we’re much improved [there],” said Marshall. “[Roman] is actually playing better; doing what he’s supposed to be doing than he did earlier in the season. But I think we’re kind of settling in on who we are offensively.”
After the Buccaneers punted for the second time, Acosta went back to work, bit this time with his arm. He connected with senior running back Jaidyn Backus on a screen pass for 39 yards, found senior wide receiver Alexander Gutierrez for 34 yards two plays later and another two plays after that, tossed a five-yard touchdown pass to Gutierrez for a 21-0 lead.
“Honestly, we were just on it from the beginning,” said Acosta. “In the beginning of the week, our new players; my transfers came in from Lakewood and my [offensive line] was absolutely fantastic today. We just had a new kick to our step. We knew we wanted to make a statement, and I think we did that.”
Acosta’s touchdown run came on fourth and eight and he credits the new linemen-junior center Sebastian Jimenez, junior right guard R’Shon Livingston and senior right tackle Bradley Park. He said he didn’t like his initial read but had to make something happen because it was fourth down.
The score would remain the same until late in the second quarter because of a combined two punts, two turnovers and a drive ending in downs. The second of those two turnovers was a fumble recovered by senior safety Malachi Williams at the Bellflower 18-yard line. After consecutive penalties, sophomore running back Brandon Martinez, a transfer from Paramount High who is also a baseball player and was making his Gahr debut, scored from 19 yards out.
Bellflower responded with best drive of the game, going 50 yards on nine plays and taking nearly the remaining 4:35 of the half off the clock and getting on the board with a three-yard touchdown run from Austin Miller. After getting one yard on six plays in the first quarter, the Buccaneers ran 15 plays for 72 yards in the next stanza.
Meanwhile, the Gladiators (3-3, 1-0) had 24 plays in the first half for 200 yards and were not quite done in the second half.
“Look, I didn’t see that coming,” said Marshall of the 28-0 halftime lead. “I knew we would play better on offense, and I thought we played a pretty good job on defense, too. Now I think we know who we are and what we can do.”
On their opening possession after halftime, Acosta threw an 18-yard touchdown pass to junior wide receiver Cody Lockart. Bellflower answered back with an 11-yard scoring run from Miller, but Backus recovered an onside attempt and on the first play of the fourth quarter, went in from a yard out.
Making matters worse for Bellflower was a fumble on the ensuing kickoff, recovered by junior Nick Washington. That led to the last touchdown of the game, a five-yard touchdown run from Martinez with 10:49 left to play. At that point, the running clock was put in effect, and the Gladiators used their backups.
Acosta was seven of 11 for 136 yards and added another 50 yards on five carries while Martinez led the blue and gold with 67 yards on seven rushes and Backus added 50 yards on nine touches. Defensively, Williams had seven and a half tackles while senior cornerback Ogadi Metu added three and a half tackles.
“I think I can do better, but it’s definitely picking up with the chemistry as we play more and more,” said Acosta. “My receivers…we’re getting more in tune slowly but surely. But I definitely worked a lot this offseason on my speed and on my body; I’m a lot bigger than last year. I’m really just trying to come in on my own and adapt to play style and try to find what I can do.”
“We finally figured out, hey, we’re going to run a little bit of this, and this is what we are passing-wise,” said Marshall of Acosta’s performance. “On Wednesday, I thought we knew what we’re supposed to do, and we’re starting to play like that.”
The Gladiators will travel to Lynwood High on Friday, hoping not to look ahead to their homecoming game on Oct. 17 against Norwalk High. Lynwood fell to Norwalk High 25-6 last Friday.
“I thought Norwalk would roll those guys,” said Marshall. “That means we’re in for another battle next week. Great, but Lynwood always plays us tough. I haven’t seen them [yet]; I don’t know anything about them.”
“I feel like it’s going to start clicking,” said Acosta. “The running game with Brandon back there and then me…I’m also fast and my receivers are fast. It’s going to be hard to gameplan against us. I wouldn’t want to be the other team facing me and my squad.”
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