SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO — San Juan Hills football coach Robert Frith loves these kinds of stories. All coaches do. Kid works his tail off as a backup, starts his first game at the last minute after the starter gets sick, plays the game of his life.
That was the tale of Landon Grant on Friday, who you would have swore had the genes of Dick Butkus somewhere in his family tree.
Grant anchored a defense that didn’t allow an offensive touchdown and paved the way for seventh-ranked San Juan Hills to score a 30-7 Bravo League victory over No. 17 Newport Harbor at San Juan Hills High.
Now the Stallions (7-1 overall, 3-0 in league) are where they want to be – a game up on the league with Villa Park on the schedule next week for the league title. After that, they have their rivalry game against Tesoro.
Newport Harbor (3-5, 2-1), which had been riding a three-game winning streak, entered the game as the other unbeaten team in the Bravo, but the Sailors offense was no match for the San Juan Hills defense.
The Sailors did muster a 92-yard kickoff return by Sammy Stremick after San Juan Hills had scored. By comparison, Stremick’s 92 yards were more than the offense gained in four quarters; Newport had 32 yards at halftime, 81 when it was over.
Stremick’s end-to-end burst made it a game. It came after Timmy Herr connected with Ryan Matheson for a 7-yard score, the last play of an 82-yard drive that, because of a penalty, actually covered 91 yards. A bad snap foiled the point-after and San Juan Hills led, 9-0.
Then Stremick made it 9-7.
San Juan Hills answered with another lengthy drive, 77 yards on 12 plays, not counting the four offensive penalties or a Sailors’ facemask. Luke Frith made a nice one-handed catch and then went into the end zone for a 16-yard score to make it 16-7 at the half.
It could have been worse, but Newport’s defense kept the Stallions out of the end zone on the first drive – which began at the Newport 39 – and forced a 27-yard Manuel Maganda field goal.
“We played them tough in the first half, made some plays, got some stops, but we didn’t make tackles,” said Newport coach Matt Burns. “I wasn’t upset by the score. But we couldn’t get anything going on offense because we were on D all the time.”
San Juan Hills ran 52 plays to Newport’s 27.
And when Newport was on offense, Grant was the face of the defense on a unit typically led by Weston Port, Tanner Rohan and Gavin Blum.
San Juan Hills limited Newport to 95 yards passing and minus-14 running. Grant had two sacks after learning on Friday that he would be the starter instead of Maxwell Porter. They alternated drives, but Grant looked like all-league. He had two sacks.
“We tell these players to be ready when your time comes and play with reckless abandon and take advantage of your opportunity, and (Grant) certainly did that,” coach Frith said.
Grant said he had a lot of confidence in his teammates.
“I knew at the start of the second half (the Sailors) weren’t going to score on us,” he said in the aftermath of his first varsity start. “It was fun. I really liked it. Rushing the quarterback is one of my favorite things to do.”
That last point is relevant because Grant is normally a linebacker but he lined up at defensive end Friday night.
Newport quarterback Jake Meer completed 14 of 18 passes for 95 yards. He was sacked three times.
San Juan Hills added to its lead in the third quarter on Elijah Ayala’s 8-yard run at 5:16 in the third quarter. The TD capped a 71-yard drive.
The Stallions ended their scoring with Timmy Herr’s 22-yard TD pass to Jake Vuoso with 6:14 remaining.
Herr finished 18 of 22 for 196 yards and three touchdowns. Ayala ran 13 times for 82 yards.
“I do believe if we do everything to our full potential, we can beat anybody in the division,” Herr said. “Our defense was really amazing and made our job easy.”
It’s enough to make opponents sick.
