Thrilling football the last two weeks

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Forgive me for saying I could care less about all the attention paid to college and NFL games after witnessing two of the greatest high school games you’d want to see the last two weeks: Mater Dei over Corona Centennial and Hart over Canyon Country Canyon.

The drama, the excitement, the individual efforts -- they’ve all been incredible. And there’s still nine weeks left in the season for a couple of teams.

Hart’s 31-28 victory over Canyon on Johnny MacArthur’s 43-yard field goal as time expired was like a Disney movie ending. MacArthur is a top golfer and soccer player who was told by most everyone that he’d be nuts coming out for football for one year and risking injury. He’d never even made a field goal until Friday night. He’d never even made an interception, until getting one with 13 seconds left on the Hart 16-yard line.

Then Delano Howell, pictured above earlier in the game, gives him a shot by running 58 yards and somehow knowing to get out of bounds at the Canyon 26 with the scoreboard clock saying there’s half of a second left in the game. On comes MacArthur, who makes the field goal. Hart players are going crazy. Canyon players are stunned after coming back from a 28-6 deficit. It’s all captured on live TV, FSN Prime Ticket.

‘Merry Christmas,’ a Hart fan tells Coach Mike Herrington afterward in the rain. Yes, New England plays the Cowboys this weekend, but this was football at its thrilling best.

- Eric Sondheimer

-- Image by Richard Hartog/Los Angeles Times