______________________________
____________________________
Valley Christian High senior quarterback Graham Lunzer was off and running against Cerritos High in last Friday night’s 50-28 victory. Lunzer rushed 17 times for 148 yards and scored twice while completing 23 passes for 318 yards and five more touchdowns. PHOTO BY STEVE FERICEAN
By Loren Kopff
Sports Editor | Follow X
September 8, 2026
It was more of the same when Valley Christian High hosted Cerritos High last Friday in the home opener for the Defenders. Not only did V.C. defeat the Dons for the sixth time since 2013 without a loss to its rival from the south side of the city, but senior quarterback Graham Lunzer put together another masterpiece performance.
In last season’s 42-23 victory, Lunzer, playing in his fourth game since transferring from St. John Bosco High, was 23 of 34 for 275 yards and two touchdowns while rushing for 36 yards and adding four more scores of two to 10 yards. Last Friday, he completed 23 of 32 passes for 318 yards and added 148 more yards with his legs on 17 carries and accounted for all seven touchdowns in a 50-28 win. It was the first win for the Defenders this season while the Dons remained winless through their first three games. The game also marked the fourth time in the series that V.C. had eclipsed the 40-point plateau while Cerritos scored 28 points against the maroon and gold for the first time since a 42-28 setback in 2013.
“I’m just excited for the guys; they’ve been working hard,” said V.C. head coach Brendan Chambers. “Coming off the loss last week against a very quality opponent in Mary Star, we knew we had a chance against Cerritos, especially with their game against Gahr. So, I just wanted them to progress and get better each and every week. I feel like they definitely showed that tonight. The last two years, we’ve been able to be the best team in Cerritos and this year, we’re tied for the best team in Cerritos with Gahr.
“I think it’s just a fun thing to motivate them,” he added. “A lot of these kids at this school don’t live in Cerritos, but there are three teams here. So, it’s just a chance for us to compete against each other. Somehow, we always play one of our better games early on in the season against Cerritos.”
The scoring began early as the Defenders took the opening kickoff and put together an eight-play drive that took nearly four and a half minutes, capped off by an 11-yard touchdown pass from Lunzer to senior wide receiver Byron Louis. Then Lunzer connected with senior tight end Sam Melcher for the two-point conversion. The celebration time didn’t last long as Cerritos senior running back Sam Reeves rushed for five yards before finding a hole for a 64-yard touchdown run 37 seconds after V.C.’s initial score.
However, Lunzer came right back and scored from 10 yards out to extend the lead to 15-7 with 5:22 remaining in the opening quarter. The hosts had a chance to go up by two scores early in the second quarter, but Cerritos senior free safety Terrence Grissom recovered a fumble at the five-yard line to stop that scoring chance. Three plays later, Grissom hauled in a 93-yard touchdown pass from junior quarterback Evan McDonald and, just like that, it was a 15-14 contest.
Almost three minutes later, the Dons took their first and only lead of the game when McDonald found senior Matthew McCoy for a 41-yard touchdown connection. But V.C. drove right back down the field and, with 32.1 seconds remaining in the half, Lunzer connected with Louis again, this time for seven yards, as the Defenders took a 22-20 lead into the locker room.
Despite Lunzer gaining 308 yards himself in the half, which was 37 yards more than what the Dons had amassed in the first 24 minutes, he admitted that the half wasn’t as perfect as he had hoped.
“A lot of ball security stuff,” said Lunzer. “You saw in the first half two fumbles; it’s not what we love to do, and that’s on me. They had some great guys in the secondary, but we were able to spread them out with a lot of empty play and getting across the middle of the field.”
“Part of it is our defense has struggled, so we know that when we have the ball, we’ve got to take care of the football,” said Chambers. “We’ve really got to try to score, especially when we get inside the red zone. So I think he took those two [fumbles] a little hard, but he knew he was going to bounce back; I knew he was. I wasn’t going to lose faith in him. But he takes it personally; he wants to score every time we get the ball, which is what I want in a quarterback.
“I’m not too surprised, honestly,” he later said. “I feel like defensively, we’re starting a lot of inexperienced guys out there. But even just the guys who we have out there didn’t play a whole lot of defense for us last year. So we know that’s going to be a struggle for us and something that we’re constantly working on.”
The only touchdown of the third quarter came by way of a two-yard Lunzer run nearly halfway through the quarter. Then the Defenders put the game away three plays into the fourth quarter as Louis hauled in a 62-yard scoring pass. V.C. senior Austin Breceda then recovered a miscue on the ensuing kickoff, and the Defenders needed four plays to make it a 43-20 contest as Lunzer threw a 21-yard scoring pass to Melcher.
__________
Valley Christian High senior wide receiver Sam Melcher hauls in a reception in front of Cerritos High senior Jaffeth Ortiz in last Friday’s city tilt. Melcher caught three passes for 40 yards and scored twice as the Defenders defeated the Dons 50-28. PHOTO BY STEVE FERICEAN.
__________
A minute later, the Dons added their final touchdown of the night when McCoy hauled in a 63-yard pass from Grissom. Just over four minutes later, Lunzer found Melcher for a seven-yard touchdown connection to end the game’s scoring.
Lunzer, who missed the final four games in their entirety last season, has accounted for all 12 touchdowns the team has scored, making his late-season injury seem invisible.
“Obviously it was a rough injury there at the end of the year,” said Lunzer. “But lots of [physical therapy] and lots of offseason work and my times ended up getting faster. So, we’re really excited to get back out and get this thing going.
“As much as I would love to take those 12 touchdowns for myself, there are so many guys who go behind those,” he later added. “I think we’re at [eight] passing touchdowns and [four] amazing receiver plays, and then we’ve got a line that’s doing great this year. We’ve had a lot of controversy in this offseason; a lot of talk about our line, but they’re doing a great job, and I love them. It’s just a great team chemistry this year.”
“It just seemed like he controlled the game more and they went no huddle [and] up tempo,” said Cerritos head coach Demel Franklin. “He understood the offense more and they let him do his thing.”
Senior running back Blake Butler added 47 yards on 11 carries, all coming in the second half, while Louis hauled in 11 passes for 191 yards. Senior wide receiver Liam Sweeney and Melcher each caught three passes for 45 and 40 yards, respectively. On defense, Butler had five and a half tackles and Melcher added four tackles.
“It’s really amazing to see; he’s grown a lot physically, but I think the main thing is his growth as a leader,” said Lunzer of his top receiving target. “He’s getting in practice; he’s talking a lot more and getting the guys going. And I think that’s his biggest improvement, is really taking that leadership role and rolling with it.”
“If we can get him not cramping, we’ll be in a good spot because we know that he’s a huge part of this offense as well,” said Chambers of Louis. “Even last week when we were playing Mary Star, they were yelling, ‘watch number four, bubble to number four’ when we were trying to get him the ball in space. We know that he’s a huge asset to this offense.”
Cerritos, which entered the game having been outscored 49-10, got 126 yards from Reeves on 13 carries while McDonald was seven of 17 for 174 yards. Grissom caught four passes for 114 yards while McCoy tacked on 119 yards to his season total on three catches. Senior linebacker Uriah Archie had 11 and a half tackles and senior Jaffeth Ortiz added seven tackles while junior defensive back Noah Sarno and Reeves each had five and a half tackles.
________________
It was a rough night for Cerritos High junior quarterback Evan McDonald who was constantly harassed by the Valley Christian High defense last Friday night in V.C.’s 50-28 victory. McDonald completed seven passes for 174 yards and a pair of touchdowns and rushed four times for four yards. PHOTO BY STEVE FERICEAN.
________________
“We started throwing the ball,” said Franklin on the difference between the first two games and last Friday’s contest. “I was way too dependent on the run, and we had to start opening it up. It was just too predictable, and we started adding a few things and we started airing it out. We have some really great athletes. We’re still making a lot of mistakes and that’s what it’s for; it is kind of getting the way they are. But we’re figuring some things.”
Cerritos returns home to face Marina High on Friday while V.C., which has 14 sophomores, 11 juniors and 10 seniors, is home again on Friday to face longtime rival Ontario Christian High. The school will be celebrating the 1986 CIF championship, which was the first of four football titles the school has won.
“The narrative is we lost a lot of seniors, but we’ve got a super talented sophomore class and a couple of juniors who are really stepping up for us big time,” said Lunzer. “I think you’ve seen us struggle in the first two weeks as these young guys are getting experience and whatnot. But they’re really grown and mature and with the right leadership, I think we’re going to do great things.”
“Like I said two weeks ago, this offense will go as far as Graham takes us,” said Chambers. “We know that he’s coming back from his injury, but he looks really good when he runs the ball, and his passing ability has improved drastically. He understands the offense and he’s just a playmaker. He just shows up on Friday night and finds the open receivers.”
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
