Freeway League : Troy Falls to Lancers in Opener

They interrupted the punt festival between Troy High School and Sunny Hills at Spaulding Field Friday night for a couple of late touchdowns and it was fortunate, otherwise they might still be trying to get in their kicks.

Thirteen punt attempts in a 48-minute game suggests that the teams had either sputtering offenses or solid defenses, but in this case it proved to be a little of both.

When it was over, Sunny Hills had outlasted Troy, 13-6, in a Freeway League opener for both schools.

The first score did not come until early in the fourth quarter when Troy quarterback David St. Clair scored on a one-yard sneak.

The play was set up by a blocked punt-both teams got in plenty of practice on that-by Troy when Wayne Ryan smothered a Sunny Hills punt attempt at the 30-yard line, with the Warriors recovering at the Lancer 2-yard line.

Two plays later, St. Clair scored, the ensuing extra point attempt was blocked.

Faced with a deficit, Sunny Hills revved up its offense long enough to drive 73 yards in nine plays. The key plays in the drive were 30- and 35-yard pass plays from Trevor Painton to Tim Imperiali, putting the ball on Troy’s 1-yard line.

Halfback David Wackerman carried it in for the touchdown, Juan Rasilla kicked the go-ahead extra point, and Sunny Hills led, 7-6, with 7:49 to play.

Even though Troy was forced to punt from its own 34-yard line on its next possession, the Warriors still weren’t out of the game until the very end.

Sunny Hills took the ball back with 5:20 to play and ran the clock down to just 38 seconds. At that point, Painton caught Troy in a safety blitz and threw a popup to the middle of the field, where Imperiali caught it and ran in for what proved to be a 64-yard touchdown pass play.

The extra point try was wide, leaving Sunny Hills ahead, 13-6.

Troy tried to come back in the time remaining, driving from its own 34-yard line to Sunny Hill’s 24 with 10 seconds left on two completions from St. Clair to tight end David Doige, but there the drive stalled.

Troy’s last desperation pass into the end zone with no time left was intercepted by Sunny Hills’ Scott Fredricks.

In other Freeway League action:

Fullerton 46, Buena Park 8--Curt Daggett caught three touchdown passes in the first half as the Indians rolled past the Coyotes in the opening league game for both teams in Fullerton District Stadium.

Daggett, who returned to action after injuring his knee three weeks ago against Kenndy, caught scoring passes of 65, 31 and 67 yards from Victor Williams, who finished the night 13 of 20 for 307 yards.

The Indians (1-0, 5-1) added two fourth-quarter touchdowns from Darrell Corbin on runs of 10 and 16 yards. Fullerton also scored on a one-yard run by Tom Hughes and a 37-yard punt return by Aaron Acton. The Coyotes’ (0-1, 1-5) only score came in the second quarter on a 90-yard pass interception return by Dave Baylor.

La Habra 28, Sonora 0--Running back Chuck Weatherspoon rushed for 222 yards on 22 carries and added two touchdowns to pace the Highlanders to a win in their league opener in La Habra.

Weatherspoon, who scored on runs of 1 and 31 yards, also shined at his defensive back position where he recovered a Raider fumble and intercepted a pass to help the Highlanders post the shutout.

La Habra quarterback Tim Shackleford tossed tossed two touchdown passes. Shackleford connected with Adolf Renaud on an 8-yard scoring play and threw a 40-yard touchdown pass to Jim Dean. Shackleford was 6 of 18 for 88 yards.