STATWATCH : Gould Nears Kicking Records and Crespi Wins Would Suit Him to a Tee

If his teammates lend a helping hand, Bill Gould might set a record with his foot.

Gould, Crespi’s placekicker, has made 55 conversions, six shy of the Southern Section single-season record of 61 set by Aldie Tatley of La Mirada in 1984. Crespi, which plays Servite in the second round of the Big Five Conference playoffs Friday, will help Gould’s cause by staying alive.

Gould, a senior, also has made 47 consecutive conversions, which ties him for fifth on the all-time Southern Section list with Rick Sims of Los Alamitos, who made 47 in a row from 1974-76. The record is 81 in a row by Steve Bayer of Claremont in 1984, ’85.

Gould’s only miss this year came in a 55-0 win over Santa Barbara. Overall, he has made 55 of 56 conversions and five of seven field-goal attempts for a total of 70 points.

Scoring: Crespi had the best points-for to points-allowed ratio among Valley-area teams in the regular season. The Celts scored an average of 39.2 points while allowing 12.9. Burroughs was second (33.0 to 10.6), Thousand Oaks third (28.7 to 7.0) and Reseda fourth (28.4 to 8.0).

El Camino Real, Newbury Park, Poly and Kennedy were the worst. El Camino Real averaged 8.7 points a game and allowed 25.1. Newbury Park (10.7 to 22.9), Poly (9.6 to 21.8) and Kennedy (9.2 to 21.0) round out the bottom four.

Passing: Granada Hills’ Jeremy Leach has passed for 2,029 yards and 25 touchdowns in 9 games, but the senior quarterback is still well behind the school single-season record set by Dana Potter in 1969. Potter passed for 3,214 yards and 36 touchdowns. Potter, who attended Nebraska and Cal State Northridge, finished with 4,869 career yards. Leach, who passed for 1,325 yards last season, has 3,354 career yards.

Leach is averaging 225 yards a game and could play as many as three more games in the playoffs. At his current pace he would finish with about 2,700 yards and 33 touchdowns.

Leach has been slowed by poor playing conditions, Coach Darryl Stroh said. “I actually thought he would have more yards at this point. But we had a couple of mud-bowl games.”

Offense: After starting the season 1-3, Camarillo won five of its last seven games. The turnaround came at the same time quarterback Donald Dodson discovered receiver Gil Valencia. After four games, Valencia had six catches. In the final six games, he had 29 receptions, nine for touchdowns. Valencia is also the all-time Ventura County career receiving yardage leader with 1,897. Erik Affholter had 1,817 from 1981-83 for Oak Park. Valencia’s 107 catches rank him No. 2 behind Sean Montgomery of St. Bonaventure, who had 108 in 1983-84. Opposing offenses also had no problem finding Valencia--the 6-1, 180-pound senior had seven interceptions after being inserted at defensive back during the second game.

Rushing: North Hollywood running back Chip Grant had more yards rushing than 33 Valley-area teams. Grant’s total of 1,900 regular-season yards, the most among Valley-area backs, was topped by only seven teams--Crespi, Canyon, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, L. A. Baptist, Taft and Sylmar.

Taft’s rushing game ranks second in the Valley area behind Crespi with a per-game average of 263.1 yards. the Toreadors rushed for more than 200 yards in each of their seven victories. Their only two losses came to Crespi and Chatsworth--the only times Taft rushed for fewer than 200 yards.

Streaks: Reseda has the Valley-area’s longest winning streak at 11, including three from last season. Hart and Chaminade have won nine in a row, and Canyon has an eight-game streak.