High School Football Game of the Week: Huntington Beach-Dana Hills

The Huntington Beach High football team has a chance to get

momentum back on its side Friday when the Oilers travel to Dana Point to

battle the Dana Hills Dolphins in their final tune-up before the start of

the 1999 Sunset League season.

The Oilers will be looking to rebound from their first loss of the

season, a 34-13 home setback to Paramount. They’ll be doing so against a

Dana Hills team that has the capability of being dangerous, yet also

displays self-destructing tendencies.

A prime example of the latter is last week’s surprising 11-5 home

defeat to Cypress.

‘Both teams could use a win to get some momentum back heading into

league play,’ Huntington Beach Coach Tony Ciarelli said of the

Independent’s Game of the Week. ‘This should be a very competitive

match-up between two defensive-minded teams.’

Before yielding 34 points to Paramount, a stingy Huntington Beach

defense had given up an average of 12 points per game.

Dana Hills, on the other hand, had been competitive in close

losses to both Fountain Valley (7-6) and Los Alamitos (21-7), before

putting it all together to stun Santa Margarita, 37-14.

But then came the equally stunning loss to Cypress.

‘They’re still a formidable football team,’ Ciarelli said of the

Dolphins, who fell 7-6 to the Oilers last year. ‘They are usually very

physical and blitz a lot on defense, which is in the tradition of Coach

(Scott) Orloff’s teams. On offense, they run some option and also use the

basic power run. It will be a challenge for our football team.’

Dana Hills (1-3) struggles on offense are mostly due to turnovers.

The Dolphins committed four in last week’s loss to Cypress, and a

two-quarterback rotation of Mike Bergey and Joseph Murray failed to

alleviate the miscues.

Leading rusher Kyle Kelly, however, was the lone bright spot in

the loss, as he rushed for 102 yards.

Kelly is Dana Hill’s leading rusher with a 5.7 average per carry.

But defense seems to drive this Dana Point team, which nearly

defeated Fountain Valley in the first week of the season.

A failed two-point attempt in the fourth quarter, and a botched

field goal attempt with 29 seconds remained, doomed the Dolphins.

Huntington Beach (3-1) will have its rushing game severly tested

in a tough road game. In the home loss to Paramount, Shaun Shuck, the

team’s leading rusher, was held to 91 yards on 24 attempts.

‘We’ll need our running game back and a big defensive performance

in order to be successful Friday,’ Ciarelli added. ‘We want to get some

momentum back for our (Sunset) league opener with Fountain Valley next

week, and one of the ways to do that is to put on a good showing at Dana

Hills.’