La Habra Finds New Weapon in Win Over Lakewood

La Habra High School used the passing of sophomore quarterback Matt Shackelford to hand Lakewood a 21-0 nonleague defeat Friday night before 300 in La Habra Stadium.

Shackelford, who had completed only 7 passes all season going into the game, completed 17 of 35 attempts against Lakewood for 381 yards and 3 touchdowns.

Going into the game, La Habra’s chief offensive threat was running back Chuck Weatherspoon, who gained 137 yards in last week’s loss to Saddleback.

The game was scoreless until the 1:45 mark of the first half when La Habra drove 53 yards on 7 plays and scored on Shackelford’s 13-yard pass to Paul Peppard to make it 7-0. In the touchdown drive, Shackelford completed 6 of 6 attempts for 65 yards to help the Highlanders survive a 12-yard loss on a sack of the quarterback on the first play of the drive.

“Matt is a quality young man and has shown poise beyond his age ever since we first put him in,” Bob Rau, La Habra coach, said. “He reads defenses really well and it was just a matter of time before he played like we knew he could.”

The Highlanders (3-1) increased their lead to 14-0 on their first possession of the second half when Shackelford hit Weatherspoon with a routine screen pass the senior turned into an 80-yard touchdown by breaking four tackles at midfield.

The score remained 14-0 until the fourth quarter when La Habra got a break. A Shackelford pass was tipped by a Lakewood defender into the hands of Peppard, who took it 95 yards for the Highlanders’ final touchdown.

Lakewood (2-1) was never able to gets its offense going and never moved deeper than La Habra’s 15-yard line. La Habra squandered several scoring chances or the game could have easily been even more of a rout.