La Cañada High football edges Verbum Dei in opener
LOS ANGELES — Every facet of La Cañada High’s football team proved to be a major catalyst in its season-opening victory Friday evening.
It was ideal for first-year head coach Ramsey Lambert, who has been stressing togetherness and playing as a team during the offseason.
La Cañada saw a balanced attack on offense, while its defense made big plays at crucial times and its special teams complemented both with a game-winning 35-yard field goal from senior Mikey Selsor to begin Lambert’s regime on a high note with a 13-12 win over Verbum Dei at Los Angeles Southwest College.
PHOTOS: Spartans outscore Vergum Dei Eagles 13-12
“We stayed with it,” said Lambert, a former assistant coach at Oak Hills. “We made more mistakes than we’d like, but we kept fighting and stuck with the game plan. Our offense was bending but not breaking and we found a way to move the ball and kept responding.”
La Cañada’s offense was paced by Ryan Breneman’s 116 rushing yards on 23 carries. The junior, along with Anthony Connell and Jace Harrick, allowed quarterback Kevin McGowin single coverage down the field, which he took advantage of on two plays of 43 and 46 yards, as he finished with 120 passing yards, including a touchdown to Trent Bauer that gave La Cañada its first lead of the game at 10-6 with 4:39 to play in the second quarter.
The touchdown came on the ensuing possession of an Andrew Sarceda interception that gave La Cañada the ball at midfield.
“Our coaching staff guaranteed that someone would get an interception if they just stayed in that area,” Lambert said. “That’s just us sticking to the game plan.”
Selsor’s first field goal of the contest, a 36-yard strike, put the Spartans on the scoreboard and cut the Eagles’ lead in half to 6-3 at the 5:56 mark of the second.
“Mikey is a huge weapon for us,” Lambert said. “He does a good job kicking, punting and hitting those field goals.”
Bauer caught one more pass for 10 yards and finished with 56 receiving yards. Todd Murray followed with 43 yards on a pair of receptions.
Breneman rushed for 89 yards in the first half, as the team compiled 183 yards of total offense, while the Eagles were held to 28.
Verbum Dei struck first in the second half, but missed the two-point conversion just as it had after the game’s first touchdown with 1:34 remaining in the opening quarter. The squandered points, especially the latter, proved vital.
La Cañada’s defense allowed only two plays of positive yardage in Verbum Dei’s two series after Selsor’s second field goal. With 2:52 remaining in the game, the Eagles offense took the field with no timeouts. The Spartans were relentless on the attack, resulting in two sacks.
After an incomplete pass on fourth down, La Cañada’s offense ran the clock out.
“It’s the greatest feeling,” Breneman said. “We totally bought into what the coach was telling us. We wanted to change the culture, we were sick of losing.
“Today we said was our pay day. The hard work in the spring and in the summer … we saw it through.”
The win became extra sweet for the team as the Spartans delivered Ramsey a victory on his birthday.
“It’s awesome,” said Lambert, who took over a team that went 5-6 a season ago and lost in the first round of the playoffs. “It’s the coolest thing that it happened on my birthday. They wanted it as a present to me. We fought hard, it’s been a grueling summer and they just brought it.”