High School Football: Sailors blanked on road

MANHATTAN BEACH — The Newport Harbor High football team players ran through a banner that read “Your school, your field, our game” just before the second half began.

The game, though, was already pretty out of reach for the Sailors by the time that intermission hit.

Newport Harbor will take a three-game losing streak into Sunset League play after being blanked at Mira Costa, 42-0, on Friday night.

The Sailors (2-3) struggled to move the ball, save for a lengthy drive to open the second half. Defensively, they gave up too many big plays to Mira Costa (3-2), the No. 8-ranked team in CIF Southern Section Division 6.

Now Newport Harbor Coach Jeff Brinkley has to hope his team can get better — and healthier — on a short week. League starts Thursday, when the Sailors play against defending champion Edison at Huntington Beach High.

“We’ve got a long way to go,” Brinkley said. “If we’re going to compete in our league, we’ve just got to keep getting better. Really, that’s our goal right now, try and get better next week. League’s starting, and the only way you make the playoffs is to have success in league. I keep telling these guys, it’s like the NFL, it’s all about making the playoffs. Once you make it, anything can happen, but you’ve got to get there. Our goal is to make the playoffs.”

Brinkley is hoping to have starting senior receiver/cornerback Levi Hooper and sophomore receiver Dayne Chalmers back next week. They missed Friday night’s game with shoulder and ankle injuries, respectively, and Brinkley said that senior linebacker Tom Phillips was out with pneumonia.

Not having Hooper and Chalmers hurt the Sailors early. Usually, they are the ones back there to return punts. Instead, Newport Harbor muffed a punt return after the defense held Mira Costa to a three-and-out on the opening series of the game.

The turnover set the Mustangs up with the ball at the Sailors 15-yard line. A play later, sophomore quarterback Reed Vabrey found wide-open receiver Alec Oshita in the end zone for the touchdown.

Vabrey, making his second start after Mira Costa lost senior quarterback David Arredondo (torn ACL and MCL) for the season, passed for three touchdowns. He also hooked up with senior receivers Sean Walker and Casey Bonner for scores. Mira Costa Coach Don Morrow said the sophomore is learning how to play the game quickly.

It was senior tailback Justin Goring who was quick on offense for the hosts, scoring on long touchdown runs of 81 and 65 yards. The latter score gave Mira Costa a 21-0 advantage midway through the second quarter. Goring finished with 207 yards rushing on just 10 carries.

The Mustangs added to the lead late in the first half, taking advantage of a Newport Harbor fumble deep in its own territory to score two touchdowns in the final two minutes.

Defensively, Morrow was happy with the job his team did on Newport Harbor senior tailback Cole Kinder. Mira Costa could load up the box; the Sailors’ passing game struggled playing without Hooper and Chalmers. Newport Harbor earned just five first downs on its seven possessions in the first half.

Kinder, coming off a school-record 327 yards rushing performance last week against Los Altos, narrowly kept his streak of rushing for triple digits in each game this season alive. He had 24 carries for 101 yards against Mira Costa.

“The first half was tremendous,” Morrow said. “I was really nervous about Newport’s ground game, kind of what they showed in that nice drive in the third quarter. We had seen them do it against everybody they played against. The CdM game, they did it in the first half against CdM. For us to have that kind of half, that was tremendous. We were pretty excited about that.”

Newport Harbor’s best chance to get on the scoreboard came on that opening possession of the third quarter. The Sailors had a 16-play drive that took more than eight minutes off of the clock. But it stalled at the Mira Costa 12-yard line, where a pass on fourth-and-goal was incomplete.

The fourth quarter was played with a running clock.

Brinkley knows his team will have to improve to hang with Edison next week. The Chargers are ranked No. 2 in Division 3.

“We had a bad week of practice,” he said. “A lot of things that went wrong. We’ll have to watch the film and try and get better.”

Nonleague

Mira Costa 42, Newport Harbor 0

SCORE BY QUARTERS

Newport 0 – 0 – 0 –0 — 0

Mira Costa 14 – 21 – 7 – 0 — 42

FIRST QUARTER

MC – Oshita 15 pass from Vabrey (Tavai kick), 10:42.

MC – Goring 81 run (Tavai kick), 7:57.

SECOND QUARTER

MC – Goring 65 run (Austin kick), 6:03.

MC – Walker 36 pass from Vabrey (Austin kick), 1:20.

MC – Bonner 3 pass from Vabrey (Austin kick), 0:28.

FOURTH QUARTER

MC – Franck-Love 3 run (Austin kick), 5:48.

INDIVIDUAL RUSHING

NH – Kinder, 24-101.

MC – Goring, 10-207, 2 TDs.

INDIVIDUAL PASSING

NH – Barela, 7-17-0, 35.

MC – Vabrey, 11-17-0, 125, 3 TDs.

INDIVIDUAL RECEIVING

NH – Bashore, 3-17.

MC – Oshita, 5-50, 1 TD.