Foothill Gains Early Foothold, Then Holds On to Top Villa Park, 21-16

With 10 seconds remaining in the game, Foothill High School coach Marty McWhinney walked back to the sidelines after confering with his offense during a time out. Along the way, he let out a long, deep sigh.

It was that kind of evening.

The Knights, who seemed to have things well in hand at halftime, managed to survive their Century League opener against Villa Park, gaining a 21-16 victory in front of 900 at Tustin High School.

“That was close in the second half,” McWhinney said. “I don’t know, we may have been too conservative.”

The Knights (3-3 overall, 1-0 in league play) were in control of the game at halftime behind the play of quarterback John Shanahan, who had his best game of the season in only two quarters of play. Shanahan threw for 131 yards and three touchdowns in the first half for a 21-7 lead.

Villa Park (3-3, 0-1), which has lost three consecutive games, pulled to within five points midway through the fourth quarter. The Knights then reverted to smash-mouth football.

Foothill held onto the ball for the final 6 minutes 56 seconds with a 13-play drive. Tailback Sean Saunders, who rushed for 98 yards, carried the ball eight times for 36 yards as the Knights moved the ball down to the Villa Park 26.

Along the way, though, there were a couple of thrills and chills.

On a fourth-and-a-foot play at the Foothill 29, McWhinney polled his offensive players during a time out, then elected to go for the first down. Shanahan fumbled the snap, but picked up the ball and dove two yards for the first down.

“I asked the kids what they wanted to do and they said go for it, which was great because that’s what I wanted to do,” McWhinney said.

The only pass on the drive came on a third-and-13 play, when Shanahan rolled away from pressure and flipped a 16-yard pass to Greg Clark. It was his only completion of the second half.

“John has really developed and is playing with a lot of confidence,” McWhinney said. “He really made some good decisions out there tonight.”

And three of them he turned into touchdowns.

All of Shanahan’s touchdown passes came on audibles. He connected with Clark for a 52-yard scoring play on the second play of the game and threw second-quarter touchdowns to Roman Slobodynskyi (26 yards) and Sean Amos (25 yards).

But the Spartans came to life at the start of the second half after a peculiar kickoff return. James Hong fielded the ball on the 11 and returned it to midfield but fumbled the ball when he was hit. Teammate Garrett Johnson picked the ball out of the air and went 53 yards to the Foothill two.

Foothill’s defense held, however, thanks in part to a 15-yard personal foul against Villa Park. The Spartans had to settle for a 21-yard field goal by Ted Burnette.

Villa Park’s defense then began to assert itself and shut down Shanahan. The Spartans had three sacks in the second half; the last one forced a fumble that was recovered by Craig Moresco to set up a touchdown.

Quarterback Jason Martian threw a 12-yard touchdown pass to Eric Helms on a fourth-down play to cap a 46-yard drive, which was kept alive by a face-mask penalty.