Costa Mesa Beats Trabuco Hills

Myron Miller’s little belief system has finally made believers out of his Costa Mesa football team.

There were days, Miller said, when he wondered if the Mustangs would never get it. But Saturday, they found that faith can move mountains.

Their 13-3 victory over Trabuco Hills at Newport Harbor High School was a moment for them to savor. It meant more than just a victory over the league’s perennial power. It put the Mustangs on target to win their first league title since 1978.

This from a program that had won 12 league games in seven seasons.

“The hardest thing was to get the kids to believe,” said Miller, a second-year coach. “We lost a lot of games because of beliefs. I kept telling the kids that someday they were going to see what I saw.”

The Mustangs not only could see what Miller saw, their view extended beyond, past Century and Estancia, their next two opponents.

“We heard all about how Costa Mesa hasn’t won a title since 1978,” linebacker Jeff Niebling said. “That’s old news. We’re here now and we’re here to stay.”

Can it get anymore blunt than that?

“No one’s going to get in our way,” Dwayne Chapman said. “We own Century. We own Estancia.”

They owned Trabuco Hills, that’s for sure.

Amazingly, Costa Mesa (5-2-1, 3-0) did it with defense. The Mustangs have lived by the best-defense-is-a-good-offense theory much of the season. Last week, they gave up 36 points to Laguna Hills, but won.

That changed. Costa Mesa limited Trabuco Hills to three yards rushing. It forced Trabuco Hills (5-3, 2-1) to rely on its passing game, and that was bad.

Quarterback Chad Collins was 10 of 36 for 172 yards. He threw high and wide much of the night. And, of the passes that were on target, many were dropped.

It wasn’t all Collins’ fault. He was literally having to run the offense. Costa Mesa had eight sacks, four by Crenshaw.

“I think we had only one first down in the second half and we still won,” Miller said. “That’s how good our defense played.”

Crenshaw, a junior defensive end/running back, also had the key play on offense. It was his 61-yard touchdown run that gave the Mustangs a 13-3 lead in the second quarter.

Trabuco Hills held Binh Tran to 51 yards rushing. He entered the game with 1,068 yards. Charles Chapman (83 yards) and Crenshaw (78 yards) picked up the slack. It was the first time this season Tran wasn’t the team’s leading rusher.

Chapman also set up the Mustangs’ first touchdown with a 30-yard punt return to the three-yard line. Tran scored on the following play for a 7-0 lead.