The Trojans faced off against Segerstrom High School in their Homecoming Game this last Friday, losing 57-0, and pushing their record to 0-5 thus far into the season. Between the halftime show and display of school spirit, it was an eventful night, with many notable alumni returning to University for the game as a celebration of the school’s 50th anniversary.  
Despite a strong defensive start, forcing a punt from Segerstrom, University struggled offensively.  After falling behind 28-0 in the first quarter, they were unable to recover from the deficit. Still, the team remains positive that they’ll perform better in upcoming league games.
Senior Noah Powell was confident in the team’s ability to improve their performance against League teams.
“Irvine teams aren’t as formidable as some of the preseason team’s we’ve faced, so I think it’s a fair match. League is definitely more important this year. It’s anybody’s league and we’re going in 0-0, so hopefully we can win at least 3 or 4 of them and make the playoffs.” Powell said
Sophomore Patrick Bassily also had an optimistic viewpoint, but believes the team needs more discipline and focus in future games.
“We are a good team, but we just aren’t disciplined. We get scored on and we’re all down. We were doing a pretty good job in the first 5 minutes, but then something went bad and we just fell apart. We just gotta stick together and trust each other.” said Bassily
Head coach Chris Hernandez echoed Powell’s statements, also treating the beginning of League as a fresh start.
“We just tell each other that we’re 0-0 right now. It’s a new season pretty much. Preseason was really difficult for us and now we’re just going in fresh. We just gotta regroup and get after it next week.” Hernandez said.
One significant thing Hernandez mentioned was the team’s struggles against injuries this season.
“We’ll get some guys back from injury and that’s gonna be key. I think we’ve had 3 linemen out this week so we had to replace them and we’re without our running back Branton Lucas. We’ve been without Patrick Bassily at receiver for the last couple weeks. We kinda eased him back at linebacker. Hopefully we’ll get him back next week at receiver.”
The Trojans next game will be against Northwood High School this Friday, October 4th, at 7:00 P.M.