Good End to Perfect Fall Season

Listen future quarterbacks. This is what you need to do. Start sneaking into football stadiums in the middle of the night. Bring your dad, bring a friend, but by all means bring a football. Sounds weird, I know. But listen. It works for Mike Good. Los Alamitos’ Mike Good. What more do you need to know?

Details? OK, this is how it goes. You’re sitting around after a late dinner--Thanksgiving dinner in Good’s case--when suddenly you get this urge. You want to throw a football. You want to throw one now. You say, “Hey Dad” and Dad knows just what you’re thinking. He grabs the keys to the car. You grab your football. Road trip for father and son.

You drive to your favorite stadium. It’s pitch dark. You hop the fence. You both feel 10 years old. Dad runs a few patterns. You’re standing on the 10-yard line. Hey, Dad says, let’s see if you can hit the crossbar on your first try. You fire the perfect spiral--whack. You’re giggling as you head back to the car.

It might not mean much, not much at all. But you’re a little superstitious and since you’ve been following this routine for three weeks--sneak into stadiums, win your game the following day--you figure why mess up a good thing. Especially during a season like this. Especially during the biggest week of your athletic life.

Mike Good, the golden arm kid, threw for 403 yards Saturday night. He completed 21 of 32 passes, including four for touchdowns. He led Los Alamitos to a 39-21 victory over Huntington Beach. It brought him and his teammates a Southern Section title, the third for the Griffins in as many years. It established Good as one of the finest in school history, bar none.

What did luck have to do with it? Not much, but Good wasn’t taking chances Friday night. He ran the sneaky stadium route again--this time with best friend and teammate Corey Barnett--and went to bed knowing everything was going to be OK. That’s the way Good is, always has been. Didn’t matter that he was No. 9 on the depth chart as a freshman. Didn’t matter that, as the season started, hardly anyone knew his name. He had confidence he could do the job, even if he was replacing a legend.

Saturday night, he was a legend. Good’s passes cruised through the air like a Concorde, smooth and accurate as could be. His four touchdowns gave him 35 for the year, tying ex-wonderboy Tim Carey. His 403 yards, fourth-best in county history, awed the crowd of 7,500, instilling in the Huntington Beach fans a feeling of dread. How could anyone beat this guy? How could they stop someone so Good? Why didn’t someone tell us he was sterling? Good had 303 yards by halftime. What were the Oiler defensive backs supposed to do, clone themselves for better coverage?

Credit, of course, must go to the players on the other end of the Good connection. Players like Anthony Tucker, who blazed routes like never before, hauling in catch after catch, making Good look even better. Players like Brad (Mellow) Melsby, a boy whose first-grade teacher predicted little Brad would have an ulcer by the time he was 8 or 9, such was his intensity. Melsby, now so laid-back you normally have to wake him between plays, performed Saturday like a demon had taken hold of his soul. Brad Melsby? Aggressive? It couldn’t have happened at a better time.

Of course, the same could be said for Good, who dedicated himself to winning a Southern Section title last summer even before it was sure he was the starter. “I believe I’ve worked harder than any quarterback in the county,” he said in September. “I threw like a million passes over the summer. I lifted weights, worked out . . . I have a tremendous amount of confidence in myself.” It certainly showed. Early in the season, Good threw for six touchdowns in a game against Palmdale. His senior year was looking promising, to say the least.

And now, a Division II title. Not a tie, an outright victory, a night of wonder and whoa-did-you-see-that?! A night that brought tears of joy to the eyes of Los Al fans and smiles of relief to its coaches. When the game was over, Good rushed to teammate Robert Torres, hugged him hard and didn’t let go. The rush of sweet victory was all around. “We Are The Champions” played from the speakers above. Good let go of Torres just as someone handed him the game ball. Like the memories of the season, he won’t let go of it soon.