Cheatham Leads Redlands to Rout of Cal Lutheran

The University of Redlands needed no tricks for visiting Cal Lutheran on Halloween night. Instead, the Bulldogs relied on the treats of fullback Sean Cheatham to register a 56-24 victory in a Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference football game Saturday.

“It was a Halloween nightmare for us, basically,” Cal Lutheran wide receiver Len Bradley said.

Cheatham gained 267 yards in 25 carries and scored on runs of one, 26 and 58 yards.

The loss eliminated visiting Cal Lutheran (3-4 overall, 2-2 in SCIAC play) from the conference title race. With the victory, Redlands (6-1, 4-0) avenged last year’s 21-10 loss to Cal Lutheran that knocked the Bulldogs out of contention for a playoff berth.

The Kingsmen fell behind, 7-0, in the first quarter on a 45-yard scoring run by quarterback Brian Harmon but cut the margin to 7-3 on a 36-yard field goal by Ben Schuldheisz.

That was as close as Cal Lutheran would get. Redlands scored the next two touchdowns to take a 21-3 lead. After Ivan Moreno’s two-yard scoring run that pulled CLU to within 21-10, Cheatham burst up the middle on a 45-yard run to set up a 14-yard touchdown pass from Harmon to Kurt Bruich only 33 seconds before the half.

Redlands rolled up 585 yards, the most CLU has allowed in school history.

It was CLU’s worst loss since a 60-0 shellacking by Cal State Sacramento in 1988.