For most of the CIF Southern Section’s football teams this week, it was the final game before heading into league play. While many schools made some bold statements in their final tuneup before the league stretch, no team made a bigger one than Harbor City Narbonne of the City Section, who completed a big Southern Section trifecta with its win over Mater Dei. The sixth edition of Prep Zone brought equally exciting action with Chaminade upsetting Sherman Oaks Notre Dame and Spring Valley Steele Canyon and Santa Clarita Canyon matching one another touchdown-for-touchdown. Here are the highlights from Week Five in the Southern Section.
Narbonne Completes Trifecta
Mater Dei came into this week ranked No. 3 in Scott Kennedy’s Southern Section rankings, its highest ranking of the season. But when faced with the challenge of stopping the hottest team in the City Section, and possibly Southern California, the perennial powerhouse had its hands full.
The game featured a hard-hitting style of defense. Patience was tested on both ends, first for the Monarchs when the Gauchos made two big plays in the first half — a 95-yard punt return and a 65-yard touchdown pass from Tory Williams to A.J. Richardson — then for Narbonne when the Monarchs completed an 80-yard scoring drive in the third quarter. It was the first time this season the Gauchos have allowed an opponent to complete a drive that long.
A fierce contest between two schools on opposite ends of the spectrum — a gritty City Section school in the industrial harbor area, and the high-end Orange County private school with a penchant for developing next-level quarterbacks — came down to just one final play.
It couldn’t have been scripted any better.
Mater Dei was down 18-7 with just one minute left to play. On fourth down, quarterback Ryan McMahon had an open receiver at the 33-yard line. McMahon let it fly but the hand of Narbonne’s Sidney Watkins got to it first, tipping it away as the Narbonne sidelines erupted.
The Gauchos are now looking formidable with wins against Long Beach Poly, Gardena Serra and now Mater Dei. They moved to 5-0 on the season in which they have faced extremely tough opponents, all of which have come on the road. The Gauchos aren’t slated to play a home game until Oct. 19, when they host neighboring San Pedro, which will be the only home game of the season for the Gauchos.
For the Monarchs (4-1), they will get a reprieve next week as they face JSerra Catholic of San Juan Capistrano, but it will be the last of the season as they then have a heavy schedule in Trinity League play.
Battle of the Valley
A few weeks ago in another Prep Zone match up, Chaminade couldn’t pull off that big win the Eagles were looking for when they faced Oaks Christian. The Eagles got another chance this week facing No. 16 Notre Dame and they took advantage, winning 35-27.
The game featured two of the area’s top running backs in Terrell Newby and Khalfani Muhammad. Both small and speedy, Muhammad is fresh off of a trip to South Bend, Ind., where he checked out the other Notre Dame, while Newby is being courted by nearly every school in the Pac-12. Neither defense knew what hit them, as both tore it up on the ground Friday night. Muhammad rushed for 103 yards and two touchdowns, while Newby rushed for more than double that to total 233 yards and score four touchdowns.
It was also a breakout game for Chaminade (4-1) junior quarterback Brad Kaaya. Making his first start, Kaaya was ultra-efficient completing 20 of 24 passes for 362 yards and one touchdown.
"This was a big personal thing for me," Kaaya told the L.A. Daily News. "Notre Dame has always been a rival."
The rival nearly got the better of him and the eagles late in the game. With 3:41 left to play, the Knights (4-2) blocked Chaminade’s field goal attempt and it landed in the hands of Miguel Ramos, who shook a defender and picked up a block from his teammates as he ran it back the other way 95 yards into the end zone to cut the lead to 35-27.
The Knights then tried to kick onside and nearly did when the ball slipped through the hands of Nolan Ramirez. But Ramirez fell on the ball to recover and the Eagles took their time to carefully manage the clock while executing the next series. Notre Dame failed to get the needed stop.
"We didn't play well as a team," Muhammad said. "We should have executed better. We just have to take this loss and move on. We've got a strong team. We can put this behind us."
Ventura County Showdown
Westlake has long been one of the top programs in the Ventura County area, but this season have fallen out of the rankings after losses to La Serna and No. 15 Crespi. But the Warriors won’t be back on top this week with a 31-20 loss to No. 6 St. Bonaventure in the Marmonte League’s headlining opener.
St. Bonaventure (5-1, 1-0 Marmonte League) has suffered just one loss this season, coming last week against a then No. 1-ranked Santa Margarita team, but continues to cruise through a demanding schedule.
Westlake (4-2, 0-1 Marmonte League) struck first but the Seraphs came right back taking advantage of a special teams miscue. In the second quarter, the Seraphs blocked a Westlake punt and Darren Flores made a heads-up play when he picked it up and ran untouched into the end zone to tie the game at seven.
Defensive and special teams mistakes would continue to haunt the Warriors. Davonte Nunery took an interception 34 yards back for a second-quarter touchdown. Then in the fourth quarter, Westlake quarterback Neil Uskali’s pass was tipped right into the hands of Marcus Chambers at the 22-yard line, and Chambers scampered down the sidelines and missed a diving defender to cruise into the end zone. A flag was thrown on the play but it didn’t change the results — St. Bonaventure’s lead held up for the win.
"You were expecting anything else from a Westlake-St. Bonaventure game?" St. Bonaventure head coach Todd Therrien asked the Ventura County Star. "We almost beat Santa Margarita last week, but that wasn't going to earn us any points tonight. We had to go out and earn this game."
Dueling Canyons
Santa Clarita Canyon High got off to a fast start against Spring Valley Steel Canyon of the San Diego Section in its home opener. But the Cowboys, who have not scored less than 49 points in a game all season, met their match. The Cougars exploded for 21 points in the fourth quarter to tie it up at 49-all. In a game where each team gave everything they could possibly give, neither came away with a loss, as the score stayed 49-49 resulting in a tie.
As anti-climactic as a tie might be, the game was anything but, as the two teams virtually punished one another’s defenses with a high-voltage and high-excitement scoring contest.
The first quarter belonged the Cowboys (3-1-1). Up 6-0 late, quarterback Cade Apsay weaved his way through the pile and zigzagged into the end zone to put Canyon up 13-0. After going up 20-7, the Cougars’ Lawrence Dickens was hit with a 65-yard touchdown pass to put Steele Canyon (1-3-1) right back in the mix. However, the Cowboys would begin to pull away going up by as much as 20.
At the start, the fourth quarter may not have seemed crucial with Steele Canyon trailing by 13. But the first play of the frame would be indicative of the rest of the game. The Cougars opened up with a 99-yard pass play for a touchdown. The play, made by Brandon Howard, brought Steele Canyon back by to within just a touchdown, 41-35. A few minutes later, Dickens would make another incredible catch off of a deflection, this one for 43 yards, to complete a 20-point comeback and go up 42-41 over Canyon.
Steele Canyon scored again with just over two minutes left to take its first lead of the game. Then, with less than a minute to play, Apsay got off a sling pass to Liam Cabrera for a short touchdown. The Cowboys then completed to the two-point conversion to tie the game at 49.
Without enough time to make it down the field, the two teams walked away with the game remaining even.
Bishop Amat Reigns
While Culver City (3-2) gave No. 17 Bishop Amat all it had in the first quarter, the Lancers (5-0-1) overpowered Culver in a 31-7 win.
The Centaurs defense held Bishop Amat to just one touchdown in the first half, and it looked as though Culver could hang with the big boys. But the Centaurs had yet to find the end zone and the defense would become weary in the second half.
Early in the third quarter, the Lancers got the offense going when Koa Haynes scrambled under pressure and threw a laser pass across the middle to Jacob Valle for a touchdown. The Lancers continued to push the tempo and the Centaurs had trouble keeping up.
Finally, Culver got on the board with just under two minutes left to play when Justin Montgomery went out wide to nab a touchdown pass.
Other Scores:
No. 4 Mission Viejo 52, Redlands East Valley 21
No. 7 Corona Centennial 68, Etiwanda 15
No. 8 Oaks Christian 36, Thousand Oaks 6
No. 11 Alemany 27, No. 19 Norco 13
Edison 31, San Clemente 3
Hart 41, Santa Monica 7
