Ross leads Eagles to Bell victory
It’s safe to say Tyler Ross comes from a divided family. He goes to Estancia High, while his two younger siblings attend the campus of the Eagles’ archrival.
Ross’ brother, Jackson, is a sophomore at Costa Mesa High, and his sister, Catherine, is an eighth-grader at Costa Mesa Middle School. Ross also went to the same middle school, before opting for Estancia before his freshman year.
In the bedroom Ross and Jackson share at their mother’s house, there are two Battle for the Bell rally towels hanging off the ceiling. Jackson thought of the idea, stabling the towels together before last week’s big rivalry football game. Costa Mesa’s towel hangs the highest and the Estancia one is right below it.
Ross is going to have to change the order of the towels and move Estancia’s to the top. His Eagles won the 49th edition of the cross-town rivalry, 23-0, and he played a vital role to his team shutting out the host Mustangs at Jim Scott Stadium.
Ross, a free safety, intercepted two second-half passes inside Estancia’s 10-yard line, allowing the Eagles to blank Costa Mesa for the first time in nine years. The junior also played running back, rushing 12 times for 36 yards, and he caught one pass for 22 yards.
The only three people on Costa Mesa’s side who probably cheered Ross on that night were Jackson, Catherine and his mother, Tracy. His dad, Kevin, an Estancia graduate, rooted for Ross from the visiting stands.
“My parents have a hard time figuring out what side to sit on [for the Battle for the Bell],” said Ross, who averaged 15.5 return yards per interception and made three tackles. “My sister was cheering for the game. She was going to come and sit on the Mesa side for the first half and then the Estancia side for the second half, but they wouldn’t let her over or something.”
The Battle for the Bell can get testy, on and off the field. By now, you have probably heard about the taunting aimed at the Mustangs and egg throwing aimed at Costa Mesa Coach Glen Fisher’s house.
Ross didn’t want to comment on the accusations levied against his team by the opposition. He preferred to focus on how Estancia ended a five-game losing streak by downing the Mustangs in Orange Coast League play.
The fashion in which the Eagles (2-5, 1-1 in league) pulled it off against the then-No. 9 team in the CIF Southern Section Southern Division poll surprised many, except Estancia Coach Mike Bargas.
“Realistically we shouldn’t have won, right? We’re 1-5 and they’re 5-1 [going into the game],” Bargas said with a little sarcasm. “I don’t consider it an upset.
“We’re a pretty physical football team and I think we were more physical.”
One of the more physical players on the Eagles is Ross, a 6-foot, 175-pounder. For the first time since Sept. 25, Ross was looking forward to showing his brute in all four quarters of a game.
Ross said he sprained his medial collateral ligament in his left knee early on in a 28-0 loss to University, forcing him to miss the team’s final nonleague game. He returned for the Eagles’ league opener on Oct. 9, playing only in the second half and only on defense in a 23-21 setback to Calvary Chapel.
The next contest was against Costa Mesa, and Ross said his doctor cleared him to play on offense. With running back Jordan Balcazar questionable to return from his separated shoulder injury and his backup, Tyler Chacon, out with an illness, Bargas needed someone to run the ball. He turned to Ross, a wide receiver who had never played running back.
“Originally I wasn’t,” Bargas said of moving Ross to tailback. “We discussed it and I said, ‘There’s no way I’m putting my second-string quarterback at running back,’ but then Jordan goes down [on Sept. 18 at Irvine], and then Chacon steps up [before having to miss the Costa Mesa game]. Once we got [Eric] Carrasco [eligible to play after he sat out the first 30 days because he transferred from Costa Mesa before his junior season], and he’s another quarterback, so [Ross’] stock goes up as a running back.”
The only advice Bargas gave Ross was to run hard. He wound up splitting time in the backfield because Balcazar made it back to the field after missing the past three games.
Balcazar recorded the big runs of 49 and 43 yards, finishing with 16 carries for 110 yards and a touchdown, but Ross contributed as well. His best runs came on the team’s final scoring drive late in the fourth quarter, moving the chains twice. The last one set the offense up with a first-and-goal on the one, where Connor Brown’s quarterback sneak for a touchdown put the finishing touches on a one-sided affair.
Bragging rights in town belong to the Eagles for the fifth time in six years. More importantly, they prevailed for the first time since defeating Loara, 37-14, in a season opener, snapping the program’s longest skid in 12 years.
“[The losing was] tough because you start getting used to the feeling,” said Ross, who hopes the win can spark Estancia in its final three league games, as it trails first-place Calvary Chapel by one game. “But you really have to dig deep. We had that first week win, then you remember the feeling you had after the game and you just push to win.
“We play a pretty tough [nonleague schedule], so I knew once we got into league, we’d be ready and we’d start turning things around.”
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Tyler Ross
Born: June 25, 1998
Hometown: Costa Mesa
Height: 6 foot
Weight: 175 pounds
Sport: Football
Year: Junior
Coach: Mike Bargas
Favorite food: Sushi
Favorite movie: “The Bourne Identity”
Favorite athletic moment: “Winning the Battle for the Bell this year.”
Week in review: Ross intercepted two passes, made three tackles, rushed 12 times for 36 yards, and caught one pass for 22 yards in the Eagles’ 23-0 win against Costa Mesa in the Battle for the Bell rivalry game.
