Paner and Rice Are David and Goliath of Marina Defense : Football: Defensive back (5-3, 115) and lineman (6-3, 260) have helped Vikings become one of county’s best at stopping opponents.

Tackle Rick Rice and free safety Axel Paner are the long and short of Marina High School’s defense.

Rice, a 6-foot-3, 260-pound senior, leads the team with 45 tackles and four sacks, 10 quarterback pressures and blocked a field-goal attempt.

“He’s the best down lineman in the Sunset League and one of the best in Orange County,” Marina Coach John Seely said. “I coached Joe Garten at Valencia, and he compares to Joe in physical skills and attitude.”

Garten is an Outland Trophy candidate at Colorado.

Paner, who barely tips the scales at 5-3 and 115 pounds, is the cornerstone of a secondary that has allowed only 595 yards and four passing touchdowns in seven games.

“I usually give kids a chance when they come into the program as freshmen,” Seely said. “But I took one look at Axel and said, ‘This kid can’t play. He’s too small.’ ”

The unlikely pair has helped establish Marina as one of the best defensive teams in the county. The Vikings have allowed only 45 points, second only to Loyola (32 allowed) in Division I play.

“One of our goals is to be the No. 1 defensive team in Division I,” Rice said.

Another is the Sunset title. Marina (5-2, 2-1 in league) is the last obstacle for Edison (6-1, 4-0) in its quest for the league championship. Edison can clinch with a victory at 7:30 tonight in Orange Coast College’s LeBard Stadium.

Marina’s prospects of challenging for the title were once as remote as those of Paner becoming a varsity starter. Only two years ago, Marina was 0-10 and was held to fewer than seven points in seven games, prompting assistant Larry Doyle to say, “We couldn’t score against air.”

Marina struggled through a 16-game losing streak and won only one game in the 1987 and ’88 seasons combined.

“You took a lot of criticism in the classroom if you were a football player in those days,” Paner said. “The stands were empty, and a lot of the guys wouldn’t come out for football. It was sad.”

Rice, who was brought up to the varsity for the final game in his sophomore year, said the program hit rock bottom in 1988, when it allowed an average of 28.7 points per game.

“The program is back to the way it was when Dave Thompson was coaching here (1973-85),” Rice said. “If you told me two years ago that we’d be playing Edison for a chance at the league title, I would have said, ‘No way.’ ”

Rice’s athletic career mirrors Marina’s program. He played on a winless team in 1988 and then experienced some success last year as a junior, when the Vikings tripled their victory total of the previous two seasons.

A promising wrestling season ended when Rice was declared academically ineligible in March for the Southern Section championships. As a sophomore wrestling in freestyle tournaments for the California Jets, Rice finished second in the state and ninth nationally.

But he had to buy a ticket to watch the state high school championships at Stockton because of his ineligibility.

“It hurt to watch knowing I had beaten three of the four finalists in the heavyweight division,” Rice said. “I realize I made a mistake by not taking my school work seriously. I never realized I could play college ball until my junior year.”

Paner’s 4.15 grade-point average would be attractive to any college recruiter. But he is smaller than Seely’s 11-year-old son, who serves as one of the team’s ball boys.

“You can’t measure Axel’s ability by his size,” Seely said. “I’m sure most coaches come into a game against us thinking they’re going to expose Axel’s size. But it never turns out that way.”

Ask Foothill. Last year, Paner helped defend Jamal Duff, Foothill’s 6-7, 225-pound tight end. This year, he drew wide receiver Sean Amos, a 6-3, 190-pound wide receiver.

“Foothill tried to run a lot of slant patterns against us,” Seely said. “They threw a pass to Amos, and Axel put a hit on him that you could hear throughout the stadium.”

Paner says he has never given much thought to his size when he’s on the field.

“You don’t have time to measure yourself up to other guys,” he said. “I never think about how big the other guys are, I just try to make the tackle. My size was never a factor until I got to the varsity, because everybody was small and nobody knew how to hit on the lower levels.”