PREP REVIEW : Meiss, Hard Work Have Orange a Step from Title

When Tom Meiss took over as Orange High School’s football coach this season, he started with the basics.

Hard work, he told his players, was all he would ask. Winning was secondary to giving your best.

“Everybody wants to win, but not very many people want to work to win,” Meiss said.

So Meiss went to work rebuilding the program at Orange, which suffered through 4-6 and 2-8 seasons the past two years.

Meiss had been through this before. He rebuilt the Santa Ana program during the late 1970s and early ‘80s.

“When I came here I saw the same things as when I was at Santa Ana,” Meiss said. “They were a group of kids who were told they didn’t have it.”

Ten victories, two losses and a tie later, Orange is in the Southern Section Division VIII championship game, the Panthers’ first title appearance since 1929. Orange plays Pacific Coast League rival Trabuco Hills at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Irvine High.

“It was a goal we felt was possible from the beginning,” Meiss said.

If that was so, Meiss wasn’t saying it publicly before the season.

Said Meiss in September: “I tell the kids, ‘First I want to get a first down; then I want to score a touchdown; then I want to win a game; then I want to win all the games.’ ”

Orange started the season with a 30-0 victory over Chino. Then came a 13-6 victory over La Quinta, which is playing for the Division VI championship against Corona del Mar Friday.

The Panthers sailed through the season with only one loss until meeting Trabuco Hills in a game that decided the Pacific Coast League championship.

Trabuco Hills won, 20-7.

Now, Meiss is hoping the Panthers can gain a measure of revenge against the defending champions.

“They’re a magnificent team,” Meiss said.

But Orange has been making a name for itself this season, too.

“I think it’s an indication of what hard work can do,” Meiss said. “It’s what we’ve worked for. It’s a pleasant reality.”

Seeing red: El Toro football Coach Bob Johnson, who lives in Mission Viejo, got a rude awakening Friday morning when he found his two cars and garage door had been spray-painted red by vandals. Red is the school color of Mission Viejo, the team El Toro played in the Division III semifinals Friday night.

El Toro scored a 28-21 overtime victory to advance to the championship game against Paramount Saturday at Cerritos College.

Johnson spent the day contacting insurance adjusters to obtain estimates to repair his damaged cars and have his garage door repainted.

“We’ve lived in Mission Viejo for years and nothing like this has ever happened,” Johnson said. “You expect pranks to happen at school, but not at your home. It really upset my family.”

(Sea) Kings of the road: The Corona del Mar girls’ volleyball team played its 5-A semifinal match at Santa Barbara, then played the 5-A championship match at Marina against Mira Costa.

In the state tournament, the Sea Kings played their first-round match at Bakersfield High, then traveled to Poway High in San Diego for their second-round match.

Tuesday, they played in San Jose against Lynbrook in the semifinals.

Said Charlie Brande, Corona del Mar coach: “My team is tough. But with the score tied, 10-10, in the fifth game in San Jose, I called time out and tried to fire them up. I told them they had to do it here if they wanted to get the state final.

“Usually they would all start screaming and yelling, but they just looked at me like, ‘Does this mean we have to go back out and jump around some more?’ They were completely out of gas.”

Corona del Mar lost, 15-9, 7-15, 15-10, 17-19, 15-12. The Sea Kings, who finished with a 26-3 record, overcame four match-point serves to force a fifth game.

Keri Phebus’ future is almost as bright as the neon pink sun visor she wore while winning her second consecutive Southern Section singles tennis title Friday.

Phebus, a sophomore at Corona del Mar, said she hasn’t been content, however. Oddly enough, having won the singles championship her first two years in high school has had a lot to do with it.

Friday might have been her last high school match.

“It’s up in the air whether I play again next year,” said Phebus, who is the nation’s top-ranked player in the 16-and-under division. “If the team has a chance to do well, I’ll play.”

Phebus was asked if there was anything left for her to accomplish on the high school level.

“They asked me that last year after I won and I said I wanted to go undefeated and win again,” Phebus said. “And I did. I went undefeated. That’s pretty good.”

Notable numbers from Fontana’s 48-35 victory over Edison in the Division I football semifinals:

962--Total yardage by the teams.

93--Total points.

50--Total first downs.