Villa Park Shuts Out Canyon, 60-0

Although Canyon Coach Tom Bailey didn’t get the word until late in the game Friday, his team played like they knew all along. The Comanches won a pregame coin flip that would settle a tie for third with Santa Ana Valley, should Canyon lose to Villa Park.

The coin flip turned out to be the best thing that happened all day for the Comanches, who were blown out by Villa Park, 60-0, in the Century League finale at El Modena High.

“I knew we’d won the coin flip late in the third quarter, but the kids didn’t know,” Bailey said. “We came out here to play.”

Canyon (4-5-1, 2-2-1) was coming off a thrilling victory in the closing minutes against El Modena last week. But the victory was also costly as the Comanches lost starting tailback Olu Davis for the season with a shoulder injury.

“We played one of our best ballgames ever last week and we just couldn’t get anything going this week,” Bailey said. “But we’re a little banged up and we couldn’t put any semblance of our offense together.”

With the victory, Villa Park clinched its second consecutive league title.

“It wasn’t expected, I’m always very nervous,” Villa Park Coach Pat Mahoney said. “They played a very good game last week against El Modena, then we looked at them on film and they looked very sound.”

Villa Park running back Dache Dameron led the way, rushing for 205 yards in 18 carries and scoring four touchdowns.

“We didn’t want to come out over-confident,” Dameron said. “We wanted to come out and play our game and just keep our heads in it.”

In another Century League game:

Foothill 42, Orange 14--Terrence Newman scored three touchdowns and gained 193 yards in 19 carries to lead Foothill to a second-place finish in the league.

Dana Pino-Dempsey added two touchdowns for the Knights, his first on a one-yard run that tied the score, 7-7, in the first quarter.