Kennedy Remains Unbeaten in League

With some sleight of hand and hard-nosed defense, Kennedy took control of the Garden Grove League race by defeating Rancho Alamitos, 27-12, Friday at Western High School.

Kennedy improved to 7-1, 5-0 in league, and remained the only unbeaten team in the league. Rancho Alamitos is 4-3-1, 3-2.

Kennedy’s defense held the Vaqueros to one yard rushing on 25 carries and sacked Rancho Alamitos quarterbacks John Frank and Manny Metcalf five times.

“The defense has carried us all year,” Kennedy Coach Mitch Olson said. “But it was nice to see the offense put some points on the board tonight.

Running back Charlie Marino led the Kennedy offense, rushing for 100 yards on 19 carries and scoring on touchdown runs of eight and 14 yards.

He also caught a 62-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Chris Clark, who completed seven of 11 passes for 125 yards and two touchdowns, on a wild double-reverse, flea-flicker play that helped put away the Vaqueros.

Olson called for the trickery after Rancho Alamitos had marched 86 yards in 14 plays to score a touchdown on John Frank’s one-yard run to cut the Kennedy lead to nine, 21-12.

With 2 minutes 10 seconds remaining in the third quarter, Kennedy faced a third and seven at its 38. Clark took the snap and handed off to Marino, who first swept to the right then handed the ball off to wide receiver Jason Myles who was sweeping back to the left.

Myles then handed the ball back to Clark, who fired the ball 20 yards upfield to a wide-open Marino, who outraced the Rancho Alamitos secondary for a touchdown to give Kennedy a 27-12 lead.

That left it to the Kennedy defense, which shut down Rancho Alamitos the rest of the way.

Following the Fighting Irish’s touchdown, Clark intercepted a pass at the Kennedy 31 to stop the Vaqueros with 1:10 remaining in the third quarter.

Rancho Alamitos got the ball back with 8:45 remaining, but could move the ball only to the Kennedy 45 when the Fighting Irish defense stopped Manny Metcalf seven yards short of a first down on a fourth and 14 with 5:02 remaining.

Leonard Lutui and Randy Ellison punctuated the victory with two sacks on the Vaqueros’ final possession.

“Kennedy is a fine football team,” Rancho Alamitos Coach Doug Case said. “They took away our power running tonight, although our sophomore quarterback (Frank) had a pretty good game. The pass was there tonight.”