Calhoun’s Games to Watch: Fountain Valley vs. Newport Harbor
October 27th, 2009, 7:04 pm · · posted by Damian Calhoun
The top games on the Week 8 schedule:
No. 4 Fountain Valley (7-0, 2-0) vs. No. 11 Newport Harbor (4-3, 1-1)
Thursday, 7 p.m. at Newport Harbor High
Outlook: The Sailors conclude their streak of three consecutive home games against undefeated league opponents with a visit from the fourth-ranked Barons.
Newport Harbor defeated Los Alamitos, 23-20, and lost to Edison, 34-6.
Cedric Whitaker leads the Sailors with 682 rushing yards, but has failed to top 100 in each of his previous three games.
Will he be able to get things back on track against the Barons?
One big challenge for the Sailors will be trying to slow the Fountain Valley offense. (The Barons are averaging 40 points a game!)
Fountain Valley has only been “held” under 35 points, just twice. Two reasons why: Kyle Middlebrooks and Dominic Ragland.
Middlebrooks has rushed 1,204 yards and 16 touchdowns. Ragland has completed 65.4 percent of his passes (68 of 104) for 1,176 yards, 13 touchdowns and just four interceptions.
Another factor is that no one has been able to slow wide receiver Ryan Steadman (24 catches, 466 yards, 6 touchdowns).
Just when you start to think that the Barons are all offense, they’re allowing 14 points a game. Scoring 40, giving up 14 … That’s a recipe for an undefeated season.
Will Newport Harbor be able to slow them down and pull the offense?
Links to the rest of the Calhoun Six (10/27/09):
No. 13 San Clemente (4-3, 1-1) vs. No. 12 Tesoro (3-4, 0-2)
Beckman (4-2-1, 1-1) vs. No. 18 Laguna Hills (5-2, 2-0)
No. 1 Edison (7-0, 2-0) vs. No. 7 Los Alamitos (6-1, 1-1)
No. 17 JSerra (6-1, 1-1) vs. No. 8 Mater Dei (3-4, 0-2)
No. 6 Orange Lutheran (4-3, 2-0) vs. St. John Bosco (4-3, 1-1)
Reader Comments
Comments are encouraged, but you must follow our User Agreement.- Keep it civil and stay on topic.
- No profanity, vulgarity, racial slurs or personal attacks.
- People who harass others or joke about tragedies will be blocked.
Comments Closed
-
-
LATEST SLIDE SHOWS
LATEST OCVARSITY VIDEOS
Media Partners :
KOCE |
MSNBC |
OCExcelsior |
Home Magazine |
Coast Magazine |
Preferred Destinations Magazine |
KPCC |
KMEX |
NguoiViet |
RSS Feed 
|
Contact us |
Privacy policy |
User agreement |
Corrections |
Career opportunities |
Advertise with us |
About us|
Archives |
Homes
Cars |
Jobs |
OC Single Scene |
California Lottery |
Register Insiders |
Register in Education |
Buy our Photos |
Feedback |
Local Businesses |
OC H.S. Sports
I was at the FV game against Esperanza on Friday. FV had it on the Esperanza 20 with over a minute left and just took a knee. It could have easily been 38-14. The last 5 minutes Middlebrooks was on the bench. Kyle Middlebrooks is hands down the fastest running back in Orange County. If there is any opening its a touchdown. Whover wins the FV / Edison game may win the title.
Kyle Middlebrooks was out of the game half of the third quarter and all of the fourth quarter.
Edison will win over fountain valley 31-17.fv offense is amazing but idont think they have not met a defense like Edison yet.Yes edison had a long gAme with mater dei but they have kepteveryone under 10 point besides the dAna hills gAme.but those teAms like dana only lost to us sAme with servite
kyle is playing this week sdont worry bought that
fv’s defense has been doing the same as edison. it simply comes down to kyle’s speed in the last few minutes of the 4th quarter. we’ll just have to wait and see
Not worried about Kyle, just that John thinks Edison is going to beat FV 31-17. They have not given up 14 points the whole season, does he really think they are going to let Edison score that many points on them? They have match ups for each one of Edisons players including the quarterback. It’s going to be a good game. Edison hasn’t met a defense like FV yet.
Middlebrooks will play and i hear is gonna be about 90%, and this kid has so much speed even at 90% he is the fastest in the county…..but it wont be enough this Edison club is great, and unless they have LOTS of mental breakdowns look for them to show their class of the division by basically passing over FV and stopping the run , they come out unblemished for week 8 with a 45 – 14 win and ere-establish themselves as the team to beat………not that havent done so in my opinion but there are people still questioning how good thety are…..people they are for real!!!
Whitaker from NH had 135 yards rushing & 1 TD on 20 carries in the Los Al game, and his per carry average was higher than Nick Richardson’s. In the Edison game he had 12 carries for 96 yards and a TD ( 8 yds/att). NH got behind versus Edison and abandoned the running game.
I think Fv will win the game- too much balance- but, “will he get back on track” regarding Whitaker is a little misleading. Neither of these excellent defenses slowed him down appreciably.
Whitaker’s game against Edison can be misleading. He finished with 96 yards, but had 65 on one carry. That means he rushed for 31 yards on his 11 other carries. That’s not a great average. Edison shut him down after that big run. And they did not abandon the running game completely until the last two drives of the game.
I was responding to Damian Cakhoun’s statement that he had not topped 100 yds in the PAST 3 GAMES, which was factually incorrect. You can say the same thing about almost any running back- take away their breakaway runs and ” that’s not a great average”. The point being- good running backs have those breakaways.
Kyle twisted his ankle and is fully recovered. Quit dreaming he is at 90% bighsfootball fan.