At Millikan’s homecoming rally on Friday, sophomore Brian Mantooth was the lucky recipient of a t-shirt toss from football coach Romeo Pellum.
Not only did Mantooth get to add to his wardrobe, but his other reward was calling the team’s first play against Cabrillo.
His friends wanted him to call a Hail Mary and although he didn’t choose that play, Mantooth still went into the bag of tricks and called for a lineman to catch a ball and run down the sideline.
Unfortunately, the Rams bobbled the snap and sophomore quarterback Myles Jackson fell on it for a loss of two yards.
The Rams scored a touchdown on the next play…but Mantooth had already given the headset back to Pellum.
“I was hyped,” said Mantooth, who is a hockey player. “I have a lot of friends on the team and it was fun.”
Mantooth was on the Rams’ sideline the entire game and said he’d love to call a play again.
The negative play was about the only thing that didn’t go right for the Rams as they cruised to a 62-0 win over the Jaguars (1-7, 0-4).
Jackson and sophomore wide receiver Ryan Pellum connected for three touchdowns (37, 27, and 70 yards) in the first seven minutes of the game and the Rams led 28-0 after one quarter.
Pellum finished with five receptions for 156 yards and three touchdowns.
Romeo Pellum said the Rams (5-4, 4-1) had their hardest week of practice since the Poly game.
“We had a lot of 1-v-1 reps in practice,” Pellum said. “We did a lot of situational work that will help us in a few weeks (playoffs).”
Senior running back Aj’ae Gravelly had two touchdown runs and Pellum played a lot of his freshmen and junior varsity players for the entire second half.
“It was huge to get our younger guys in,” Pellum said. “It’s not often you can get them (backups) for a whole half of football.”
Millikan hosts Wilson next Friday in the regular season finale while Cabrillo hosts Compton.
