‘Thunder and thunder’: Mira Loma runs past Delta to reach section’s 8-man final

Frankie Arizmendez earned a free pass from baking responsibilities for his family’s Thanksgiving celebration. He can eat all he wants and then, early next Saturday morning, hopefully grab a heaping helping of the Mira Loma Matadors first CIF Sac-Joaquin Section title in a major sport in decades.

The senior running back for the Matadors rushed for a team-high 136 yards on 18 carries to lead the Matadors over the Delta Saints of Clarksburg, 48-34, in a Division VIII playoff semifinal at El Camino High School. The Matadors advanced to play Foresthill, a 35-13 winner over Vacaville Christian in the other semifinal.

The inaugural Sac-Joaquin 8-man football final is scheduled for 9 a.m. Nov. 29 at Hughes Stadium on the campus of Sacramento City College.

“I usually do like a lot of the cooking stuff, but instead I get to go out there and be with my boys practicing in the morning,” Arizmendez said. “I help a lot with the baking. I’m a big-time baker, I just help a lot with baking the pies and making side dishes like sweet potatoes and all the other good stuff. This year, it’s all my mom.”

That’s OK, Arizmendez said, because his mom is a Delta High grad and threatened to “talk a lot of smack” to her boy if the Saints won.

Arizmendez was able to rumble through huge holes for much of the game and got important yardage on third-down plays. His only score was on a 3-yard dive play while carrying two defenders across the goal line. Matadors quarterback Deangelo Keys rushed for two scores and Wema Kyubwa had a score and converted on all six two-point attempts.

“They’re just workhorses” said Matadors coach Jess Collins of Arizmendez and Kyubwa. “All we have is thunder and thunder. One guy comes out, next guy comes in and Frankie has just ran hard like that all year long. I tell him to put their guys in your backpack and walk them down the field.”

Arizmendez is a four-year starter, as are most of the seniors on the squad. They’ve been through some lean times, including an 0-7 record last season in the Pioneer Valley League. This year, playing in the new 8-man division, the Matadors are 11-0 and averaging more than 40 points a game.

“Being a part of this program, as a freshman, it really wasn’t all that,” Arizmendez said. “I joined the school thinking we weren’t going to do amazing things as we are today. But as you can see, we’re doing amazing things, and it feels amazing to see how much growth me and my friends have gone through, because there’s a small group — all the seniors on this team have pretty much played since day one.”

Because of low participation numbers despite an enrollment of 1,600 students, the Matadors haven’t fielded a freshmen or junior varsity team in a dozen years. Arizmendez is not small at 5-9 and 185 pounds, but as a freshman playing on varsity, he recalled the frequent mismatches.

“It was rough,” he said. “You’re going against guys two, three times your size as freshman, but you get really aggressive on the ball because we all have instilled in us from day one to no matter how big the guy is to try your best and just perform to the best of your ability no matter what the odds are. And we still do that.”

Neither program was in danger of folding. But neither the Matadors or Saints were likely to win a section in years past.

Mira Loma beat Delta 44-0 in Week 4 and held the Saints to 98 yards in total offense. But Delta was missing starting quarterback Chase Parkinson and pair of starters on defense in the first meeting, Delta coach Tim Rapp said.

“Last week was our first time we had won a playoff game since 2009,” Rapp said. “We can make the playoffs in Division VII, but the first round, we were always out by a good, you know, 30-40 points playing against Woodland Christian or La Grand or some other power. You know, we’re getting 20-22 kids per year. When they gave the ultimatum, they said, let us know by the 31st of January if you want to do it. And, so, we decided, okay, it might be best. And it did work out because we ended up with only 17 guys this year.”

Delta’s enrollment is just under 200 students. Mira Loma has 1,400 more students than Delta, so just one class matriculating through the Sacramento campus is four times larger than the entire enrollment in Clarksburg. Competitive equity may become an issue in subsequent years, Rapp said.

“We had 18 to 20 players on any given night last year for 11-man,” Rapp said before the game Friday night. “We had up to 19 guys early this season, but an ACL took one kid out, grades took another kid out, so we’re at 17 now. Most of the time we were running with between 15 and 16 suiting up for games, depending on injuries and stuff like that. So, I don’t think (8-man football) saved us yet, you know, schools like Valley High School and Florin High School, where they lost their 11-man programs last year, maybe it saved their programs. And that’s a good thing.”

Collins, the Mira Loma coach, has been waiting his whole life to practice on Thanksgiving. He gets the chance on Thursday and then the chance to make school history on Saturday.

“It’s kind of surreal in-the-moment right now,” he said. “I think it’ll start to kick in as we get towards next week, but I’m just really happy and proud for the kids and proud for the program. We’ve come a long way. These kids have been grinding, and it’s all the kids that came before them, that are part of this, too, because they’ve put in the effort throughout the years to get our program turned around in the right direction. We’ve gone through a lot of losing, and so, just the attitudes and just the change of perspective has been huge for us.”

This story was originally published November 21, 2025 at 10:57 PM.