Some considered Arcadia vs. Saguaro the matchup of the week in Arizona high school football leading up to the game. But it turned into a mismatch Friday.

“Our guys didn’t compete,” Arcadia coach Kerry Taylor said after a 70-14 loss. “I don’t care about wins and losses. What is important to me is that we compete for four quarters. We didn’t compete tonight. I thought (we) were intimidated from the beginning.”

The intimidation stemmed from the Sabercats plethora of Division I recruits, including Kelee Ringo, the No. 2 cornerback in the class of 2020 according to 247sports.com.

“They’re definitely a talented team,” Taylor said. "They have a lot of guys on that team that are going to play at the next level.”

Arcadia offensive assistant Oscar Alexander echoed Taylor.

“I don’t think you can simulate the speed and the power of a Saguaro team in practice,” Alexander said.

From the start, the visiting Titans were overmatched in all facets. On the Titans first drive, quarterback Kadin Beler, who was under pressure all night, threw a pick six to Sabercats linebacker Alani Ma’aufu. And before the Titans could even get a first down, they were down 21-0.

The Titans finally put points on the board toward the end of the first quarter when wide receiver Kylin Johnson ran for a 25-yard touchdown set up by a 52-yard screen play to running back Paxton Earl.

However, the touchdown did not kickstart the Titans. The Sabercats continued the onslaught in the second quarter with four more touchdowns, including a 30-yard touchdown reception by wide receiver Brayden Green with under a minute left in the first half to make the score 49-14 going into the break.

The Sabercats did not take their foot off the gas in the second half. They scored two more times in the third quarter tand a David Soboyejo 6yard touchdown run completed the 70-14 rout in the fourth.

“I don’t think we did anything well today,” Taylor said. “Special teams (was) awful. Offense, defense was pretty bad. We’ve got to figure it out. We’ve got to get tougher.”

Taylor said all the Titans can do from here is learn from their mistakes, watch film and get better.

With the loss, the Titans (5-1) felt defeat for the first time after going 0-10 last year.

"Just because I show up and I’m the head coach doesn’t mean we’re going to win every single game,” Taylor said. “They’ve got to figure out that we’ve got to grow up as a team.”

Arcadia athletic director Cher Fesenmaier said that the game could have be an outlier in the season and stayed positive looking toward the rest of the Titans schedule.

“When we looked at our schedule, this was that one game that we thought, this might be our toughest competition,” Fesenmaier said. “From here on out, we can win our last (four) games and still go 9-1.”

The Titans return home to play Mesquite Friday at 7 p.m.