El Camino Wins the Grudge Match : Warriors Defeat Fullerton, 31-24

The night of Oct. 1, 1988, was one El Camino Coach John Featherstone would have probably liked to forget, but couldn’t.

He can put those memories to rest now.

Saturday night, in a battle of two pass-happy offenses, Featherstone and El Camino took a measure of revenge from Fullerton College with a 31-24 victory at Fullerton District Stadium.

The payback came almost exactly a year after El Camino’s last loss--a heartbreaking 38-36 setback to Fullerton, then ranked No. 1 in the state. That loss snapped a 13-game El Camino winning streak and marred what was nearly a perfect season.

Saturday night, El Camino (3-0) withstood a last-ditch Fullerton comeback and held on for the victory.

Fullerton trimmed the El Camino lead to 31-24 when Jeff Andrews took a pitch four yards around the left side for a touchdown with 3:25 left in the game. But Kevin Leon’s attempt at an on-side kick squibbed untouched out of bounds before it went 10 yards.

El Camino got on the board first in Saturday night’s grudge match when flanker David Blakes leaped high to snare a three-yard touchdown pass from Frank Dolce.

Fullerton roared right back to take a 10-7 lead on a 13-yard touchdown pass from David Chisum to tight end Richard Nelson, and Eric Lange’s 20-yard field goal.

But El Camino dominated both sides of the ball from that point on. An 80-yard second-quarter drive was capped when tailback Alfred Lowe took a pitch around the left end four yards for a touchdown. Lowe added a 13-yard TD dash in the third quarter.

Anthony Cole’s interception set up the second El Camino touchdown of the quarter. On first down, Dolce receiver hit Shannon Thompson, who juked his way 62 yards across the middle to the Fullerton 14. Dolce capped the drive on a three-yard bootleg.

Dolce, who started slowly, got on track to complete 20 of 40 passes for 305 yards and a touchdown. Blakes was his favorite receiver, catching six passes for 90 yards, and Khevin Pratt caught three for 68 yards. The running game was virtually non-existent: Al Savea led El Camino with 43 yards.

El Camino’s defense sacked Chisum five times, twice by defensive end Jeffery Cummins, once each by Gregory Franklin and Tracy Gentry, and once on a safety blitz by Niu Sale.