ORANGE — The Dana Hills football team is getting depth at a key position and it couldn’t come at a better time.
Junior running back Radley Geiss ran for a team-high 164 yards and a touchdown while Owen Walz contributed 121 rushing yards and a TD to help Dana Hills beat Orange 35-14 in the Foxtrot League on Thursday night at El Modena High.
Walz missed a few games with an injury, but he thrived in his first game back, and Dolphins coach Tony Henney noticed the impact of the ground game, especially late in the contest.
“I thought our running game got going with our little two-headed monster,” Henney said. “Walz was out for weeks, so finally having him healthy, with Radley (Geiss), you’re seeing a burst in the fourth quarter rather than a tired running back. So that was big, and I thought our offensive line started to assert themselves in the second half and that was fantastic.”
Geiss broke free for a 51-yard touchdown on the first play in the fourth quarter to give Dana Hills (7-0, 2-0) a commanding 28-0 lead with 11:50 left to play.
“If you would’ve told me 7-0 (record) before the season started, I would’ve liked to buy some stock in that,” said Henney, who is off to his best start at Dana Hills during his four-year stint.
Orange struggled to finish drives for most of the game but finally got on the board in the fourth when Xavier Valentine scored on a 5-yard run. That drive was sparked by a 48-yard strike from freshman QB Star Thomas to Preston Brown.
Jordan Hardaway also scored for the Panthers on a 10-yard run late in the fourth quarter.
“We were pretty worried about them coming in, they have some great, young players on that team and they play extremely hard.” Henney said. “Obviously, they were a league champ last year so I thought we did a great job from a physicality standpoint,”
Henney also thought the keys to limiting Orange offensively came down to the fundamentals.
“Tackle, you gotta tackle right. They have a bunch of kids that can do something once they have the ball in their hands, so you have to limit big plays and for the most part we did that,” he said.
Dana Hills quarterback Vanden Dugger threw three touchdown passes, one to Nicholas Newsom in the first quarter and two to James Leicester.
Leicester’s caught two passes for 40 yards and both went for scores while Cameron Weaver had five receptions for 60-yards.
Dana Hills will look to stay atop the Foxtrot League standings next week as it takes on Fountain Valley. Orange (1-6, 1-1) will face Northwood in its next game.
Panthers coach Robert Pedroza is just looking forward to the next opportunity at redemption and improvement in the final weeks of the season.
“We have to bounce back because we dropped one in league so now we have to pick up a couple of victories in the last three weeks to try to get in the playoffs,” Pedroza said. “Northwood is another great opponent, everyone we face in league is very good, so we have to show a better effort and come with a better performance than we did tonight.”
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