Mater Dei 58, West Covina 6

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Opening kickoff: Returned 94 yards for a touchdown. The game could have ended right there, but unfortunately for West Covina it went on. And on. And on.

Mater Dei was every bit as good as advertise and West Covina was every bit as young as people said they were.

I know I said last week that I would do a The Good, The Bad and The Ugly for each team, but I’m just going to point out what stood out from each game, not each team.

Here we go...

The Good: Matt Barkley. He is 6 feet 3, weighs 222 pounds, has a cannon for an arm and, most noteworthy of all, is only a junior. He threw for 309 yards and three touchdowns(*). West Covina Coach Mike Maggiore pointed out how Barkley looked much better than he did last year when the two teams played. ‘He seemed like he’s a lot stronger with his arm. He was making all the throws -- the deep outs, the post, the corners.’

The Bad: West Covina. Who else would you expect in a game that ended 58-6? The Bulldogs seemed in OK spirits afterward. They are a lot better than the score would indicate, but Mater Dei is still Mater Dei. ‘This is the best team, I’ve been here 15 years, this is the best team we’ve played by far,’ Maggiore said of the top-ranked Monarchs. West Covina did have a couple of chances in the first half, but turnovers are costly (especially in the red zone).

The Ugly: The score. They had a running clock in the fourth quarter.

So, looking back at it all, how dominant was Mater Dei? I don’t know. The Monarch only had the ball for 5:27 seconds in the first half. So I didn’t see much of them. But I really liked what I saw. I can’t say the same about West Covina, though. It’s unfair to judge the Bulldogs on how they played against a team like Mater Dei, which has their sights set on national glory. So I won’t.

And yes, I do mean national glory. Check tomorrow to find out what Barkley said about that.

- Jaime Cárdenas

* Correction, Barkley threw for four touchdowns. Both the Register’s Dan Albano and the SGV’Ts Scott French say so. I went back through my notes and noticed that I did miss a touchdown. He threw so many that I lost count. Sorry about that.