Vedder Rallies Laguna Hills in Final Seconds

Among Justin Vedder’s finest qualities as a quarterback is his coolness under pressure. He proved it again Friday night.

Vedder, a left-handed junior, combined with Ryan Geyer on an eight-yard touchdown pass with 13 seconds to play to give Laguna Hills a 34-28 victory over Costa Mesa in a Pacific Coast League game at Newport Harbor High.

The touchdown was the fourth of the night thrown by Vedder, who completed 14 of 25 attempts for 279 yards. It came on a second-and-four situation when Vedder found Geyer wide open in the end zone on what he said was a coverage mismatch, and hushed a Costa Mesa homecoming crowd of 2,500.

“They (Costa Mesa) split their safeties and put a down lineman on the tight end (Geyer),” Vedder said. “Ryan did a nice job getting open.”

Vedder found plenty of other guys open all night, particularly tight-end Chris Baedeker. The two hooked up on scoring plays of 74, 35 and 22 yards, and also on a 20-yard pass play that set up Baedeker’s first touchdown. Baedeker finished with a game-high 151 yards in four receptions.

Laguna Hills (6-1, 1-1 in league) started the winning drive at its own 25-yard line with 3:03 remaining. The Hawks advanced to the Costa Mesa eight with 17 seconds to play but Coach Steve Bresnahan elected to run one more play instead of attempting a field goal. The strategy worked.

“The ball was wet out there and there are a lot of variables,” Bresnahan said. “That was a nice read by Justin.”

Costa Mesa (3-4, 1-1) gave Vedder a lot of room to throw but kept the Laguna Hills running game in check (76 yards rushing) while unleashing its usually solid ground attack, although not by the expected source.

The Mustangs lost junior tailback Binh Tran, the county’s leading rusher going into the game with 1,261 yards, with a hip pointer early in the second quarter. Tran, who gained more than 300 yards in each of his last two games, finished with 94 yards and had a 44-yard touchdown run that gave Costa Mesa a 7-0 lead. Mustang Coach Myron Miller said Tran might be out for at least two weeks.

With Tran out, senior tailback Kevin Shanklin picked up the slack with 142 yards in 25 carries and two touchdowns. His last score, on a five-yard run, gave the Mustangs a 28-27 lead with 3:10 left.

Costa Mesa’s other score came on a 30-yard pass from Jeff Niebling to James Vega in the second quarter. Niebling threw an incomplete pass in his only other attempt.

Miller, though disappointed, was pleased with his team’s performance.

“We got our guys to play football for 48 minutes,” Miller said. “I’m happy about that.”