By Uy Pham
On Oct. 21, the FVHS football team faced off against the Edison Chargers at the Lebard Stadium at Orange Coast College. Coming off a rocky start in the Sunset League with losses to Newport Harbor, Corona del Mar, and Huntington Beach, the Barons faced another tough league opponent.
In another edition of the Bell Game, the Barons sought to snap the Chargers’ 17-year winning streak in the rivalry. However, the game ended with a 0-50 loss for the Barons, extending their losing streak to 18 years and resulting in a 4-5 record for FVHS in all matches.
“[Our goal] was to win [and that] didn’t play out too well,” Fountain Valley head coach David Gutierrez said.
Sophomore Nolan Olivares kicked off the game with a punt to the Edison Chargers. The Barons held firm with contested passes by seniors Kyle Nguyen and Caine Elroy. Failing to reach a first down, the Chargers were immediately forced to punt in their first drive of the game.
To begin their first drive, junior quarterback Noa Banua handed off passes to seniors Tyler Arevalos and Ben Pham. Collectively, these runs fell short of first down, and on fourth and three, Olivares punted the ball to the Chargers with 8:40 remaining in the quarter.
However, the Chargers blocked the punt, positioning them thirty yards away from the endzone. At 7:58 in the quarter, a quick pass and spin led to a bolt into the endzone for the Chargers’ first touchdown of the game. Following the conversion of the extra point, the Chargers started off with a 0-7 lead.
In their second drive, the Barons chose to run a different style of play. Senior Abdel Habibeh played as quarterback and ran the ball three consecutive times. Due to a flag for delaying the game, the Barons again fell short of the first down and Olivares punted the ball back to the Chargers.
“We’ve been trying to install a new [offensive] system this week, but we came out with it and they stopped it right away, so our offense… we’re still trying to improve that,” Pham said.
The Chargers capitalized on their built momentum with a combination of a pass and run play to set themselves 30 yards from a touchdown. An overthrown pass and tackles from Arevalos and senior Fernando Garcia did little to hold the Chargers back. With 3:42 remaining in the quarter, a 30-yard pass to the left side scored Edison’s second touchdown. With a missed extra point, the Chargers nevertheless increased their lead to 0-13.
On the next drive, Banua returned to quarterback. Another flag for a delay of game set the Barons to first and 15. Habibeh ran the ball, but the play was followed by a dropped pass by Olivares. With 2:43 remaining, on third and 14, Banua threw an interception while trying to complete a pass to senior Joey Garcia.
A strong tackle by senior Adrian Esquivel initially slowed down the Chargers, but at 1:48 in the second play of the drive, a deep pass to the left side of the end zone resulted in another Charger touchdown. The Chargers faked an extra point attempt which led to a successful two-point conversion and an increase in their lead to 0-21.
Barons made another change to their quarterback by replacing Banua with Olivares. Three consecutive snaps to Olivares led to runs that failed to gain any yardage. As a result, the Barons punted back to the Chargers to end the first quarter. The Chargers failed to gain any momentum with strong tackles by Pham, Nguyen and Fernando Garcia.
A series of completed plays helped the Barons slowly regain some tempo. Two runs by Habibeh positioned the Barons at third and two with nine minutes remaining in the second quarter. A pass to Elroy gave the Barons a first down. However, the Barons could not progress further up the field, and Banua was sacked on third and 10 with 6:56 remaining.
Edison’s next drive consisted of slow but effective progress toward the end zone. The Chargers initially gained few yards due to tackles by Pham, Habibeh and Joey Garcia. However, a 30-yard pass by the Chargers followed with 20 yards remaining to the endzone. Contested passes by Nguyen and Elroy along with a tackle by Pham forced the Chargers to settle for a field goal. At 2:51, Edison converted and increased their lead to 0-24.
Banua connected with Olivares and Pham on various runs and passes, but the Barons failed to reach first down again. With 40 seconds remaining, Edison connected on a 20-yard pass. Followed by a 25-yard pass, Edison prepared for a first and goal with 18 seconds remaining. The Chargers successfully completed a pass to the right side, and the extra point ended the quarter with a score of 0-31.
The Barons started off the second half with runs by Habibeh and Pham, but a sack to Banua caused the Barons to fall short on third and one. Just in front of the endzone, the Chargers blocked an attempted punt by the Barons. Nguyen and junior Hayden Espinoza held the Chargers back for two plays, but at 8:43, the Chargers faked a pass and spun into the endzone for the touchdown. The extra point hit the goalpost, but the Chargers still maintained a lead of 0-37.
Another false start was assessed against the Barons resulting in a first and 15. A run by senior Max Smith gained some yardage, but an intercepted pass by Banua toward Habibeh followed. With eight minutes remaining in the third quarter, the Chargers carried the intercepted ball into the endzone for another touchdown. The lead grew to 0-43 following the conversion of the extra point.
A catch by Pham and run by Habibeh followed with a run by Banua, but a holding penalty set the Barons to third and 26. Another incomplete pass led to another punt by the Barons. However, at 5:23 the Barons missed the punt, and Edison recovered the ball for another touchdown. Another extra point conversion magnified the lead to 0-50 for the Chargers.
“I think we did [well] battling adversity, [but] we needed to fix our special teams,” Pham said. “We had a lot of problems with that.”
To end the third quarter, the Barons used a series of runs and short passes. Smith, Pham and Esquivel slowly helped the Barons progress up the field for several first downs.
However, at the beginning of the fourth, the Barons failed to convert for another first down, and the Chargers gained possession after the turnover on downs. Following a failure by the Chargers to reach a first down, at 7:36 the Barons attempted to put together a final drive to score some points.
“I think [our] defense did good, but we just gave up too many blown coverages [and] too many big plays,” Pham said. “We were locking them down the whole time, we had the energy, we just needed to do that every single play and we didn’t.”
Running plays by Smith, Esquivel and Pham carried the Barons to about 20 yards from the endzone. Following a false start penalty and a timeout, the Barons had one last play with nine seconds remaining in the game. A pass to sophomore Brady Tomko for twenty yards failed to reach the end zone after the Chargers forced Tomko out-of-bounds.
“We are very excited that the community came out,” Gutierrez said. “We had a lot of our students out here, probably teachers, parents [and] families. We are grateful for that, [and] we would love to thank them.”
Despite a losing streak, the team envisions a bright future for Barons’ football.
“I think next week we will be able to execute a lot more against [Los Alamitos] and put up some points,” Fernando Garcia said. “Playoffs or not, I am overall proud and happy of this team and how far we came. The team has a bright future coming into next year.”
The Barons’ last Sunset League game will be an away game against the Los Alamitos Griffins on Oct. 27 in the Veterans Memorial Stadium at Long Beach City College.
