High School Football : Granite Hills’ Giles Is Playing Catchup With Rushing Record

Brian Giles has been trying to keep up with Tom Vardell since they played Pop Warner football. But Vardell always has managed to stay a couple steps ahead.

In his senior season at Granite Hills High School, Giles has one last chance to catch up.

Vardell was a running back at Granite Hills until 1986 and is now a redshirt freshman at Stanford. He set the Granite Hills season rushing record in 1986 with 1,812 yards, second on the all-time county list behind the 2,124 by Vista’s Tommy Booker the same year. Booker is at San Diego State.

Giles, 5 feet 10 inches and 190 pounds, is the top returning back in the county this season, having rushed 1,043 yards and 13 touchdowns as a junior.

So far, Giles has run for 433 yards, including 206 on 24 carries last week against Santana. He already has seven rushing touchdowns.

Giles and improved Granite Hills (2-1) travel to Patrick Henry (2-1) at 7 o’clock tonight in a game that features two playoff teams from last year. Granite Hills has beaten Patrick Henry in two previous meetings, 21-7 in 1985 and 34-17 in the second round of the 1979 playoffs.

“It was like a little competition between me and Vardell,” Giles said. “When I was on the junior varsity, I would run for 167 yards and then go to the varsity game, and he would come up with 220, so he was usually leading.

“I’ve known him since Pop Warner, although he was always two divisions ahead of me. But we were in competition way back then.”

Giles now has set his sights on Vardell’s school record and says he’d like to gain 2,000 yards and score 20 touchdowns this season.

He might have a chance, thanks to a small change in the offensive line after a 28-6 loss to seventh-ranked San Dieguito: Eddie Ayala, an all-league tackle last season, was moved to center.

The move has made the Granite Hills veer-option offense run much smoother, and Ayala has been better able to lead the line.

“I’ve got more responsibility now,” Ayala said. “I’m the leader of the offensive line. They listen to me now at center. It was hard to lead at tackle because I had to concentrate more on my position. I played center all my life until last year.”

After the switch, Granite Hills defeated Grossmont, 45-20, and Santana, 27-0. And Giles has been a beneficiary of the change.

“We couldn’t run a simple power play (before the switch),” Giles said. “(Ayala) was the leader last year as a junior with our young line. The linemen have adapted to our offense.”

Patrick Henry lost, 38-21, to San Dieguito after a 10-7 victory over Chula Vista and last week defeated Kearny, 24-10.