Football: Manderino sparkles in all-star game

Richard Dunn

NORWALK - After standing on the sideline and watching the offensive

unit of the Los Angeles County All-Stars march down the field Saturday

night in the first L.A. County-Orange County High School Football

All-Star Game at Cerritos College, Chris Manderino of Newport Harbor High

decided to do something about it.

Manderino, the starting tailback for La Habra Coach Frank Mazzotta’s

Orange County All-Stars, nudged on the coach’s shirt in the first half

and said, “I can really help out on defense.”

So Manderino, the All-Star team’s leading rusher with 50 yards on 11

carries, played defensive end late in the first half and remained there

throughout most of the second half in a 7-0 victory for L.A. County.

Manderino, voted the Orange County MVP in the game before an estimated

1,000 fans, was one of four Sailors in the inaugural contest, along with

linebacker Andy Rankin, offensive lineman Scott Lopez and defensive

lineman Nick Moghaddam.

On one defensive stop, Rankin and Manderino combined to knock L.A.

County quarterback Rick Meyer of La Mirada out of the game in the second

half.

“(Rankin) did really well,” said Manderino, who played linebacker at

Newport Harbor and practiced some on defense prior to the all-star game,

but never at defensive end.

“I just wanted to get in the ballgame and start playing,” added

Manderino, who, by the fourth quarter, was calling defensive plays for

Mazzotta’s team.

With all four Tars in the starting lineup, it was business as usual

for Manderino, whose longest carry (15 yards) came in the second half and

almost broke a 60-yarder for a touchdown, before getting his ankle jarred

from behind.

“Scott Lopez did a really good job of blocking for me,” Manderino

said. “That’s why I was able to do so well on offense.”

The L.A. County All-Stars scored the game’s only touchdown on a

77-yard pass play from Los Altos quarterback Felipe Aguilar to Downey’s

Justin Phinisee with 4:54 left in the second quarter. Phinisee was voted

the L.A. County MVP.

Manderino, who reports next week to training camp at UC Berkeley,

where he’ll be a walk-on player for the Golden Bears, also played for the

South in the Orange County All-Star Game earlier this month at Orange

Coast College.

To start the L.A. County-Orange County game, Orange County’s offense

came out in a shotgun formation, but, following a seven-minute delay in

the action, the team was informed that because of “certain rules of the

All-Star game,” it could not operate out of the shotgun.

“There was a big discrepancy,” said Manderino, who added that Orange

County offensive players were bumping into each other following the

ruling, which, apparently, nobody from Orange County knew about because

the team spent an entire week practicing out of the shotgun.

At halftime, Manderino spoke up and influenced a change in the offense

to an I formation, which proved successful. “That turned things around,”

said Manderino, the only player on the team to go both ways.

The Newport-Mesa District Most Valuable Player and CIF Southern

Section Division VI Offensive Player of the Year in 2000, Manderino

scored a district-record 31 touchdowns last season for Coach Jeff

Brinkley’s Tars, who won the CIF Division VI title in 1999 when Manderino

was a junior quarterback.

Last season, after starting the campaign under center, Manderino was

shifted to tailback at halftime of a Week 2 loss to Marina. Beginning the

next week, Manderino started at tailback and the Sailors won 10 of their

next 11 games to earn a return trip to the CIF Division VI championship

game.