It's over at OCC...
Final Score...
La Mirada 49
Garden Grove 27
The Shadow: December 2009 Archives
JT Torres scores on a 52-yard run and La Mirada now up, 42-21.
Shane Blood returns an interception 17 yards for a TD and La Mirada now leads 35-21. ... Garden Grove is really missing their injured QB.
J.T. Torres scored on a 7-yard TD run on La Mirada's first possession of the third quarter to tie the game at 21-21.
Then, La Mirada went ahead on a 26-yard TD pass from Daniel Poncedeleon to Julian Matta to go up 28-21 over Garden Grove.
Lots going on in the CIF Southern Division title game at Orange Coast College...
First, La Mirada blocks a punt, and that leads to a J.T. Torres TD run, 7-0, La Mirada.
Garden Grove bounces back with three unanswered TDs, 21-7, Garden Grove.
La Mirada then scores on a 29-yard Max Gama run to cut Garden Grove's lead to 21-14.
Also, Garden Grove's starting QB is out with injured ribs. Game is still in the second quarter.
Garden Grove is a solid team and it has played on emotion most of the season after one of their players died after collapsing during a game. However, Norwalk probably should have beaten Garden Grove it they didn't shoot themselves in the foot with sloppy play. La Mirada will not break down like that tonight.
La Mirada 34
Garden Grove 20
Two surfers ride a huge wave at Waimea Bay on the north shore of Oahu in Haleiwa, Hawaii, on Monday. In Long Beach Monday, it was flat.
OK Norwalk, The Shadow wants your HONEST opinion (don't be hatin' on La Mirada). You guys played both La Mirada and Garden Grove. Those two games are your only losses this year. La Mirada beat you, 42-33; Garden Grove beat you, 35-23. So, who wins the CIF Southern Division final on Friday? In the next day or two, The Shadow will give his prediction.
Norwalk falls to Garden Grove, 35-23. Garden Grove will face La Mirada in the Southern Division final next week.
Edison 37
Lakewood 29
Edison will face Servite next week for the Pac-5 title.
Lakewood attempts an onside kick but Edison recovers.
Scroggins to Lewis for an 8-yard TD pass, but the PAT is wide right. Edison leads, 37-29, with 2:19 left.
On third and 18 from their 34, Scroggins hits Lewis over the middle and Lewis carries the ball to the Edison 15.
Third and 18 for Lakewood at their 34 with 3:12 left
8-yard TD run by Edison's Houston. PAT is good and Edison leads, 37-23 with 4:23 left in game.
Big hit on Woods on a screen pass and Edison recovers.
Edison takes the ensuing kickoff and drives to a TD, scoring on Viles' 9-yard pass to Leener. PAT is good and Edison leads, 30-23, with 7:14 to go in fourth.
On third and 8 from the 16, Scroggins throw a TD pass to Utupo. Lakewood goes for 2 and Scroggins throws to Powell for the conversion. Game tied, 23-23.
Scroggins throws deep down the right sideline complete to Anderson for a 48-yard gain to the Edison 19.
Lakewood first and 10 from their 33.
Edison has third-and-6 from their own 36 but Viles is sacked, end of third quarter. Edison will punt to open the fourth quarter.
Woods returns the kickoff 81 yards for a TD. Lakewood going to two, Scroggins scrambles out of trouble and scores. Edison leads, 23-15.
Edison kicks a 20-yard field goal and now leads, 23-7, with 2:56 left in the third quarter.
Edison has second-and-3 from the 13.
Viles throws to Leener and Edison has the ball at the Lakewood 32, less than 7 minutes left in the third.
Lakewood has a third-and-16, Scroggins' throw to the middle of the field is perfect but what should have been a gain of at least 20 yards is an incompletion because the pass is dropped. Lakewood punts.
Third-and-2 from the 5, but Lakewood jumps offsides and Edison has a first and goal at the 3. First play, 3-yard run for a TD, 20-7, Edison, PAT is no good.
First play from scrimmage in second half and Edison calls a running play and goes to Lakewood 13.
Edison returns second half kickoff 30 yards.
Garden Grove leads Norwalk at halftime, 7-3.
Viles drops to pass but is under pressure and hit, he fumbles the ball and Lakewood recovers with 14 seconds left. Lakewood takes a knee and it's halftime. Edison leads, 14-7.
Edison QB Viles sacked at 14 yard line; Edison calls timeout with 24 seconds until halftime. Third and goal.
Viles passes 31 yards to Eddy to Lakewood's 6, 37 seconds until the half.
Lakewood's 34-yard field goal attempt is blocked and Edison returns the blocked kick to the Lakewood 38 with less than a minute until halftime.
Viles to Trojan on a 35-yard TD pass and Edison has a 14-7 lead over Lakewood with 5:44 left in the second quarter.
Viles 5-yard pass to Zumwalt for a TD and Edison is tied up with Lakewood, 7-7, early second quarter.
Lakewood leads, 7-0, at end of first quarter, but Edison is driving.
Lakewood QB Jesse Scroggins scores on an 8-yard QB draw to give Lakewood a 7-0 lead in the first quarter.
Talking to a source who's seen a lot of Pac-5 and Orange County football this year, he seems to think football in the area is down this year overall, meaning that Edison isn't as good as one might think. Beating all those teams in the OC and Sunset League would mean more in different years. And that's why he thinks Lakewood has a chance. As for me, I think Lakewood has a chance if they can get off to a fast start. Many times this year they've started slow and had to come back. If they have to come back against Edison, good luck. But if they can hang early, maybe they can do it. They have their share of big-play athletes, and when you have that big-play capability, you can compete in any game. I'm gonna stick with my prediction of an Edison win early, but stay tuned... I've been wrong before.
Seems kinda strange that Garden Grove is 12-0 and the No. 1 seed, yet all the "experts" seem to think it's going to be a Norwalk blowout. Who am I to argue?
Norwalk 42
Garden Grove 20
Servite up, 19-18, in the fourth quarter.
Dominguez falls to Alemany in Western Division semifinal, 35-24.
Alemany scores with 3 minutes left and increases lead over Dominguez to 35-24.
Laguna Hills fails to score on their OT possesion. La Mirada wins, 27-24, advances to Southern Division championship game.
La Mirada got the first possession of OT and drove the ball to the Laguna Hills 4, but couldn't punch it in. They settled for a 20-yard field goal by Matta and lead 27-24. Laguna Hills now gets the ball at the 25.
Mission Viejo and Servite now tied at 12-12 in the fourth.
Mission Viejo and Servite tied at 6-6.
Dominguez scores with 5:31 left in fourth to cut Alemany lead to 28-24.
Alemany increases lead over Dominguez to 28-17 in the fourth quarter.
Laguna Hills scores with 37 seconds left, kicks PAT to tie game at 24-24. Looks like OT.
Laguna Hills recovers an onside kick and how has the ball on the La Mirada 20 with a minute left.
Laguna Hills scores with 2:48 left in game, trails La Mirada 24-17.
Alemany has gone ahead of Dominguez in the third quarter, 21-17.
La Mirada opens the second half strong. First a field goal, then a 9-yard TD pass from Poncedeleon to Gama. They go for 2 and Poncedeleon completes a pass to Matta for the score and La Mirada now leads Laguna Hills, 24-10, midway through the fourth quarter.
Mission Viejo leads Servite, 6-3, in the first quarter. The winner of this game plays for the Pac-5 title against tomorrow's Edison-Lakewood winner.
Dominguez is in the end zone again early in the second quarter to take a 14-7 lead on Alemany.
Laguna Hills scores with 14 seconds left in the half and cuts La Mirada's lead to 13-10.
A 23-yard TD run by Justin Torres has given La Mirada a 13-3 lead in the second quarter.
Dominguez took an early 7-0 lead, but Alemany has scored to tie the game at 7-7 late in the first Qtr.
Field goal by Laguna cuts La Mirada lead to 7-3.
Justin Torres scores on a 17-yard run; La Mirada up, 7-0
Laguna Hills plays tough, physical defense and has won nine in a row. But when they've played tough, physical teams, like Trabuco Hills and El Toro, they've been beaten down.
La Mirada 34
Laguna Hills 17
Dominguez is smokin' hot right now. They rolled up 64 points against No.. 2 seed Culver City in a first-round upset, then added 48 points in their second-round win over Redondo. Alemany is seeded No. 3 in the Western Division, and they obviously have a good defense. Last week, they held Warren to just 7 points and Warren's explosive running back Jesse Callier to "just" 135 yards. So who wins out? Dominguez's suddenly powerful offense or Alemany's defense?
Dominguez 38
Alemany 20
Coming soon: La Mirada vs. Laguna Hills ...
We have four area teams in the CIF semifinals Friday and Saturday: Lakewood, Dominguez, Norwalk and La Mirada. One by one, The Shadow will make his predictions for the games, starting with Lakewood-Edison in the Pac-5 Division.
True story. I had a dream a couple nights ago. In my dream, I didn't go to the game so I checked online to see the final score. And it popped up, Lakewood 38, Edison 10. OK, OK, not all dreams come true. Here's my prediction:
Edison 31
Lakewood 21
Coming soon: Dominguez-Alemany prediction ...
Interesting column by Bob Keisser that will run in Wednesday's Press-Telegram. Get a sneak peek right here:
Raul Lara has the largest coaching staff in the CIF-Southern Section.
Each game, he has his official assistants on the field and in the press box, plus the benefit of 4,000
Lara has been around long enough
When Friday's highly competitive and entertaining game was over, the werewolves that weren't cast in
Walking down the steps from the press box, I casually listened to what the fans were saying, and wanted to put my hands over the ears of some of the children in the crowd. Such language. Then I got on the field and realized what I thought was a brisk wind was actually the second- and third-guessing whizzing around the sidelines.
Like the whole Poly-Dylan Lagarde-Los Alamitos-Dylan Cook saga, I wanted to remind all of these fine people that this was high school football, a classroom in cleats, and that digressing on the coach's abilities and lamenting a dropped pass by a junior or a missed tackle by a sophomore was sort of like rubbing that D or F in their face.
Such is life. Lara has a grip on it, and he has the final say when it comes to what the kids hear at game's end.
"I told several people and the kids that I believe this team has learned the most of any football team we've had here, because we've been through so much adversity, and we didn't quit in the face of it and instead kept working and got better," Lara said.
"What we accomplished is getting a young team to understand what it takes to play at Poly and what it takes to win big games. These kids learned lessons that will benefit them for the rest of their life and will set a pattern for how this team works this off-season and how it will perform next season."
Lara doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about the chorus, usually only when someone asks him this question. He knows that the team's success --
He does pose this response: How did this team get better if there wasn't some good coaching? Poly was crushed by Servite in the season opener, 30-7, opened the season 1-3, went through a quarterback change that saw the sophomore who lost his job quit the team, and then had its record league winning streak snapped by Lakewood.
By season's end, they had knocked off Los Alamitos in the playoffs and lost to Servite again, this time in a game that came down to which team eventually ran out of time.
Unlike past Poly teams, the '09 team didn't have a lot of game-changers
There were answers to the thorniest questions left over from Friday.
Answer: Clay is generously listed at 5-11 and 175, and the kind of hits a receiver takes are different than those of a back. He had only five carries in the first half and finished with 15 for 135, including his 64-yard burst for a touchdown that gave Poly the lead with four-plus minutes left.
But that's not the visual Lara remembers. "If you saw how beat up this kid was, you'd know why we played other (backs)," he said. "The trainers pulled his shirt up at halftime and I went over to see why, and he had tons of scratches and bruises on his back from where Servite players grabbed him and hit him.
"He wasn't ready to be a 30-carry running back. Plus, when we use him in the backfield, we lose our best receiver
What was the rational for his Bill Belichick moment when he ran a fake punt from his own 24 in the third quarter?
"We decided before the game that we'd take some gambles," he said. "We were supposed to run the fake on our first punt, but it was fourth-and-long, and then it was blocked.
"We knew backed up that they'd come after us, so we called the fake. (Alex Roniss) had a huge hol
Lara said there were other moments like that. A missed block on a fake field goal left the play a yard short of a first down, and Chris Leachman threw to a short receiver on the last drive when he had a wide-open receiver deep.
There was also the phantom pass interference penalty on a fourth down incompletion by Servite that extended the Friars' game-winning drive, but he's not going to gripe too much about the officiating in a game that was played at 100 miles per hour and featured fierce hitting.
"It was one of those games where if everything had gone right, we win," Lara said. "It also was a game I could walk away from and think that maybe Servite is destined to win it all."
All he really knows is that Poly will be better for the experience. No one will take championships for granted, for a while, and he will return a lot of starters, especially on defense. "I told everyone at the start of the season that this would be a difficult season," he said. "I'll tell anyone who asks that we'll be back next season."
Including, one presumes, all of his unpaid assistants.
