Mission Viejo Defense Gets Stingy, Shuts Down Sunny Hills

Mission Viejo stopped Sunny Hills 10 yards shy of a touchdown in the final drive of the game to preserve a 3-0 nonleague victory Friday night at Buena Park High.

Sunny Hills got the ball on its 44 and drove to the Mission Viejo 10 with 43 seconds left in the game. Four consecutive incompletions were the result.

Mission Viejo (2-2) scored on a 47-yard field goal by Nick Gilliam with 7 minutes 50 seconds left in the first quarter. The only turnover of the game, a fumble recovery by Tom Baribeau on the Lancer 35, helped set up the field goal.

Sunny Hills (2-2) came back when Guy Porter ran the kickoff back 77 yards to the Diablo 16. Devon Huff missed a 31-yard field-goal attempt.

Jared Ritter blocked the Lancers’ 39-yard attempt in the second quarter and Baribeau recovered the ball for Mission Viejo.

Sunny Hills controlled the ball in the second half but the punting of Brock Amos kept putting the Lancers in poor field position. Amos had punts of 65 and 45 yards to pin down the Sunny Hills offense until the final series of downs.

Chris Zeiler completed 20 of 33 pass attempts for 190 yards. The Lancers’ Grady Funk had 10 receptions for 109 yards.

Sunny Hills limited Mission Viejo to 80 yards.