Deason Does it All as Short-Handed Orange Beats Anaheim

Although Orange’s starting quarterback James Starr had to watch from the sideline, his teammate, Derald Deason, made sure the Panther offense produced Friday.

Deason caught two touchdown passes, ran for one score and intercepted a pass to lead Orange over Anaheim, 24-20, in a nonleague football game at El Modena High.

“Derald is a great athlete who can do tremendous things both on offense and defense,” Orange Coach Dick Hill said. “I guess we haven’t been getting him the ball as much as we could.”

The Panthers corrected that Friday.

Deason, a junior, caught four passes for 67 yards including touchdown receptions of 18 and 19 yards. He scored on a five-yard run off of a reverse. He also completed a 45-yard pass to Chance Perry to set up one of his touchdown receptions from back-up quarterback Sean Jones, who was making his first start.

Jones completed five of eight passes for 80 yards and no interceptions. Although he did fumble three times, he filled in admirably.

Starr suffered a concussion in a 29-0 loss to Edison Oct. 4 and sat out Friday’s game on the advice of his doctors.

So with Orange (2-3) playing short-handed, it looked like it could be an easy target for Anaheim (1-4) and its quarterback Luis Gomez, who passed for a county-record 504 yards in a 51-27 victory over over Cypress last week.

But the Panther defense responded, sacking Gomez five times and intercepting him twice.

Gomez completed 17 of 37 passes for 250 yards, but he did have three touchdown passes to give him 14 this season.

Anaheim rushed for only 11 yards until its final scoring drive when it trailed, 24-14, with 3 minutes 17 seconds remaining after Orange’s Steve Gonzales kicked his first field goal of the season, a 36-yarder.

Anaheim made it 24-20 when Gomez completed a five-yard touchdown pass to Jesus Acevedo, his third touchdown reception, with 38 seconds remaining.

After Anaheim went for the two-point conversion and Gomez’ pass into the end zone fell incomplete, Orange sealed the victory when Chris Mayes recovered the ensuing onside kick attempt.