The San Gabriel Valley Tribune, Pasadena Star-News and Whittier Daily News high school football team previews for the 2025 season<\/p>\n
ROWLAND RAIDERS<\/p>\n
Head Coach: Citos Marinez<\/p>\n
Offensive Coordinator: Citos Marinez<\/p>\n
Defensive Coordinator: Paul Rodriguez<\/p>\n
2024 Record: 6-4 overall; 1-2 in Gano League (third)<\/p>\n
TOP RETURNING PLAYERS ON OFFENSE<\/p>\n
Bryce Johnson, RB, Sr., Gano League first team<\/p>\n
Damien Arrieta, QB, Sr., Gano League first team<\/p>\n
Aiden Opatkiewicz, WR\/K, Sr., Gano League first team<\/p>\n
Sergio Rodriguez, OL, Sr.<\/p>\n
Edgar Goff, OL, Sr.<\/p>\n
Alex Huerta, HB, Sr.<\/p>\n
TOP RETURNING PLAYERS ON DEFENSE<\/p>\n
Frankie Trujillo, LB, Sr., Gano League first team<\/p>\n
Alex Huerta, LB, Sr.<\/p>\n
Elias Hayward, DB, Sr.<\/p>\n
TOP NEWCOMERS<\/p>\n
CJ Carillo, RB\/DB, Sr., transfer from Northview, Valle Vista League first team<\/p>\n
Xavier Carillo, ATH, Fr.<\/p>\n
Kayleb Nicholson, ATH, Fr.<\/p>\n
STRENGTHS: The senior-heavy Raiders have several players that will be three-year starters, and two key impact players that were Gano League first team selections in quarterback Damien Arrieta and running back Bryce Johnson. Arrieta is a solid dual-threat who threw for 1,103 yards and 12 touchdowns and rushed for 434 yards and eight TDs. Johnson ran for nearly a 1,000 yards with 11 touchdowns. CJ Carillo, a senior transfer from Northview, will also help in the backfield and in the secondary. Carillo earned Valle Vista Leaue first team honors last season for his defense.\u00a0 Aiden Opatkiewicz was the Raiders\u2019 top receiver last season with 27 receptions for 443 yards and five touchdowns. Frankie Trujillo leads the defense. He was a Gano League first team pick at linebacker.<\/p>\n
OUTLOOK: The Raiders were one of the best teams to miss the playoffs last season. They were 6-2 before losing their final two league games to Don Lugo (22-15) and Chaffey (30-26) to knock them out of the playoffs. They routed rival Nogales (42-28) and were just a few breaks from being 9-1 or 8-2. And they have most of their weapons back and a strong coaching staff led by Citos Marinez. If they stay healthy, they have a good chance to win league and make the playoffs for the first time in 13 years. They don\u2019t have a daunting schedule, but a challenging one, which should get them ready for league. They will certainly be a team to watch come playoff time.<\/p>\n
COACH CITOS MARINEZ: \u201cWe have not made the playoffs since 2012 and after a 6-4 season with three of those losses by one possession, we are looking to find a way to close the gap and win those close games. Rowland Heights is a community rich with football history and tradition. We look forward to fans coming out to experience our unique version of Friday night lights and fielding a product on the field that generates community and school pride.\u201d<\/p>\n
SCHEDULE<\/p>\n
Aug. 29 vs. Wilson<\/p>\n
Sept. 5 at Valencia<\/p>\n
Sept. 12 at Walnut<\/p>\n
Sept. 19 at Nogales<\/p>\n
Sept. 26 vs. Diamond Bar<\/p>\n
Oct. 3 at Artesia<\/p>\n
Oct. 10 vs. Pioneer<\/p>\n
Oct. 17 vs. Chaffey*<\/p>\n
Oct. 24 at Montclair*<\/p>\n
Oct. 31 vs. Don Lugo*<\/p>\n
Originally Published: June 27, 2025 at 5:53 AM PDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Gabriel Valley Tribune, Pasadena Star-News and Whittier Daily News high school football team previews for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":162814,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2065],"tags":[7,36633,2682,3131,1744,393,2455,2454,6,525,9],"class_list":{"0":"post-165135","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-las-vegas-raiders","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-high-school-all-sports","10":"tag-high-school-football","11":"tag-high-school-sports","12":"tag-las-vegas","13":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","14":"tag-lasvegas","15":"tag-lasvegasraiders","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-raiders","18":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114760833085782418","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/162814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}