Balanced Longhorns’ attack piles up 382 yards of total offense
to rout Acorns
Campbell – Live Oak High couldn’t get its offense going until it was too late and Leigh had too many weapons of its own and beat the Acorns 34-8 on Saturday at Westmont High.
“They’re an awfully good team,” Live Oak coach Rick Booth said of the unbeaten Longhorns (5-0, 2-0 Blossom Valley Athletic League Mount Hamilton Division). “We can’t make mistakes against them.”
The Acorns (2-3, 0-2) were penalized seven times for 73 yards and fumbled three times (lost one) in the game.
Live Oak started out the game strong defensively by forcing a punt but Leigh took control of the game’s tempo with its second drive. The Longhorns moved the ball 60 yards on 10 plays before 6-foot-3, 245-pound running back Dylan August barely crossed the goalline from 1-yard out on a fourth-and-goal play to give Leigh the early lead.
A promising drive for the Acorns was doomed when a holding call negated a nice third-and-eight run by Steven Rodriguez and that drive eventually stalled.
The Longhorns stretched the lead to 20-0 by halftime by scoring on their final two possessions of the half. Doug Webster connected with Daniel Franke on a 60-yard touchdown pass midway through the second quarter and with 5.5 seconds left in the half, Webster found senior wide receiver Chris Balcom-Miller for his first of two 25-yard touchdown receptions of the game.
“I told the kids at halftime that I’m proud of them,” Booth said. “They’re playing hard, we’ve always played hard, its just that we’re not as physical as they are.”
Balcom-Miller’s second touchdown reception came on Leigh’s first possession of the second half to make it 28-0 before Live Oak finally got rolling.
The Acorns marched 56 yards on 13 plays before senior running back Kevin Abbott broke free from 11 yards out to get Live Oak on the scoreboard.
After Webster threw his fourth touchdown pass of the game to make it 34-8, the Acorns appeared set to reach the end zone again, but a fumble at the Leigh 4-yard line was recovered by the Longhorns to seal the game.
“They had size over us,” Live Oak junior linebacker Garrett Webb said. “But I think it was just that we didn’t play as good as we could.”
Abbott topped the 100-yard mark for the fourth time in five tries with his 16-carry, 106-yard effort and is averaging 129.4 yards per game this season.
Junior Varsity
Campbell – Live Oak’s JV football team overcame five turnover to earn its third straight win and moved to 3-1-1 on the season with a 26-14 defeat of Leigh on Saturday.
Jeff Blean broke a long touchdown run with 1:32 left in the game to put away the Longhorns.
Quarterback Jeff Roberts had one rushing touchdown and also threw touchdown passes to Michael Singleton and James Araiza in the win, which made the Acorns 2-0 in league play.
