South-West Rallies for 20-13 Victory : Prep Senior Bowl: Two second-half touchdown passes help rally team from 7-0 halftime deficit.

Angelo Jackson said he has been around enough high school football all-star games to know that patience and perseverance often pays off.

It did Saturday night in the 16th annual Los Angeles Prep Senior Bowl at El Camino College.

Shaking off a sluggish and ineffective first half, Jackson’s South-West squad rebounded for a come-from-behind 20-13 victory over the North-East before 3,500.

The victory ruined a 113-yard rushing performance by most valuable player Tony Thomas of Jefferson.

In the first half, South-West failed to complete a pass and gained only 18 yards. But in the second half, it seemingly moved the ball at will.

“In games of this type, it sometimes takes a while to get things going,” said Jackson, who is the Inglewood coach. “That’s why you’ve got to stick with your game plan and hope that you finally get something going.

“We stuck around and kept playing hard and were rewarded with the victory.”

South-West quarterbacks Damon Williams and Rahim Muhammad threw second-half scoring passes to David Saraf and Gerald Lacey and fullback Maurice Collins-Speaks ran for another.

Trailing, 7-0, the South-West tied the score on its first possession of the second half. Starting at midfield after an North-East penalty, the South-West scored when Fairfax quarterback Muhammad passed to Beverly Hills wide receiver Saraf for a 34-yard touchdown.

The North-East responded by moving 50 yards in seven plays to reclaim the lead when quarterback Sheldon Anderson scored on a nine-yard run.

Trailing, 13-7, the South-West tied the score on fullback Collins-Speaks’ one-yard run. A two-point conversion attempt failed.

The South-West defense, aided by an unnecessary roughness penalty, forced an North-East punt from its 16-yard line.

Charles Town returned the punt 36 yards to the North-East 21. Quarterback Williams of Dorsey passed to Lacey on the next play to give South-West a 20-13 lead.

“Our defense played better in the second half but the real difference was ball control,” Jackson said. “We forced four second-half punts and took care of the ball when we had it, and that can really hurt a team.

“We didn’t do that in the first half and even though we were only down a touchdown, things weren’t going well because of that.”

Although it dominated the first half statistically, the North-East could score only a touchdown, that on fullback Thompson’s 14-yard run with nine seconds before halftime.

Thanks to two time-consuming drives, the North-East held the ball for 18 minutes and ran off 30 plays in the half, compared to only six plays for the South-West. The North-East managed 105 total yards.

North-East’s first possession of the game--a 21-play, 13-minute drive--ended when Anderson missed a 36-yard field goal attempt.

But the North-East finally scored on a 10-play drive that ended with Thompson’s run. Third-down runs by Thompson and Anderson helped keep the drive alive.

Anderson finished with 39 yards rushing and Darrel Davis of Manual Arts added 29 on five carries.

Muhammad, who was three of four passing for 61 yards, led South-West runners with three carries for 32 yards, and Collins-Speaks added 13. Williams completed two of four passes for 49 yards.