Santa Margarita Is Beaten Up but Still Beats Woodbridge

The final statistics painted a picture of a defensive struggle. Derek Yankoff was sacked 11 times for minus 80 yards. Overall, his team rushed 29 times and gained 10 yards.

Yes, Yankoff and Santa Margarita were expecting defense when they dug in against Woodbridge Friday night. Little did they know that they could post those kinds of numbers and still win.

Buoyed by its own defense, which held a vice-like grip on the Warriors, Santa Margarita scored a 14-0 Sea View League victory over the Warriors Friday in front of 3,200 at Irvine High.

“Woodbridge has a hell of a defense,” Santa Margarita Coach Jim Hartigan said. “They held us to 14 and I think we have a pretty good offense. I thought we played sloppy, but maybe we were sloppy because they were pretty good.”

Maybe. Woodbridge (3-0, 0-1 in league) had surrendered only 17 points in its first three games, and Santa Margarita (4-0, 1-0) had scored 101.

It was a rough night for Yankoff, the quarterback who was averaging 80 yards rushing per game. Yankoff is adept at escaping a pass rush, but Woodbridge’s talented defense banged away at him, making quite an impression along the way. Jesse Liu had three sacks, and seven different players took their hacks at Yankoff.

But Woodbridge couldn’t score. Its quarterback, Matt Sauk, completed three of 15 passes for 11 yards, and had two passes intercepted. He didn’t get off easy, either--he was sacked six times for a loss of 58 yards. Woodbridge’s 24 rushing attempts netted minus 5 yards.

Yankoff completed 12 of 30 passes for 157 yards, one interception and two touchdowns. And even when he got his passes off, he often got leveled.

“The line played their butts off,” Yankoff graciously said. “So they missed a couple of blocks--that’s not a problem.”

Santa Margarita scored both of its touchdowns in the second quarter. The second scoring drive started at the 16 and appeared to stall when, on a third-and-three from the 23, Yankoff was sacked for a 10-yard loss by John Torge. But Yankoff was speared at the end of the play, giving the drive new life at the 28.

Two plays later, on third-and-10, a halfback pass from Chris Collins--the backup quarterback--to Brad Finneran netted 53 yards. Three plays later, Yankoff found Brian Finneran open on a slant pattern for a 12-yard touchdown pass play. Ryan Korinke’s second extra point made it 14-0 with 2:52 remaining.

Santa Margarita scored first, with 10:49 left in the second quarter, on a nine-yard scoring pass from Yankoff to Brian Finneran. The drive began at the Woodbridge 37, after Collins recovered a fumble in the Warrior backfield.

“The defense played a great game except for three plays,” Gibson said. “If you told me before the game we’d hold them to 14, I’d have said we would have won.”