Ready for another feat

The J.R. Tolver Era opened with an impressive 28-26 upset of Fairmont Prep last week. And, now the Sage Hill School football team can accomplish another feat today.

If the Lightning beat Animo Leadership, in a nonleague game that starts today at noon at Locke High in Los Angeles, they will have matched last year’s win total.

Last year, Sage Hill beat Animo, 24-8, but that means little to first-year-coach Tolver and his players. The Aztec Eagles opened this season with a 25-0 win over California School for the Deaf of Riverside.

Certainly, the Lightning’s victory last week was a great start. The Huskies, who went 8-3 in 2008, entered ranked No. 9 in the CIF Southern Section Northeast Division preseason coaches’ poll.

Tolver, who is also an athletic director at Sage Hill, said he wanted to help build school spirit and pride throughout the sports programs. The big win greatly assisted that goal, he said.

The Lightning have garnered confidence, but Tolver, a former NFL wide receiver who starred at San Diego State, has been doing his best to keep them level headed.

“Our team understands that over the course of our season we will respect every opponent we face, but fear none,” Tolver said. “That being said we prepare diligently for every game on our schedule. That approach creates a natural shift of focus from one week to the next. With the Fairmont game being behind us, we must now focus all of our energy and efforts against Animo.”

Using some of the same characteristics shown last week should help the Lightning against the Aztec Eagles. Tolver said he wanted his team to establish its toughness, that meant he wanted to run the football well on offense and stop the running back on defense.

Tolver liked what he saw last week. There were two rushers who went over 100 yards, fullback Dusty Orrantia with 122 yards and tailback Taylor Ross had 103.

The defense did allow 175 rushing yards, but Sage Hill’s 168 of its own were just enough to help earn the win.