Senior Christian Gomez takes down a Pirates player during his team’s 35-7 win over Morro Bay on Oct. 9. Photo by Aaron Crutchfield.

After a 35-7 rout over Morro Bay High School on homecoming night, the Templeton Eagles are now 4-1 overall, 1-1 Los Padres League.

In that game against the Pirates, the most important factor in getting the win was an early start with scoring, according to Templeton High School Varsity football coach Dave Harper.

"We worked all week in practice just starting the game off quickly and not waiting until third or fourth quarter to get going, and so that was great that we started out of the gate so quick," Harper said.

In the Pirates game, the Eagles scored two touchdowns in the first quarter. The Pirates scored their only touchdown of the game in the second and going into halftime the game stood at 14-7.

The Eagles came out in the third and added two more touchdowns and one more in the final quarter to clinch the win.

"So that was much better than our game against St. Joseph," Harper said. "And not taking anything away from St. Joseph, they're an outstanding football team. But we just started quicker than we did against St. Joseph, and did some things well and scored quickly [against Morro Bay]."

Offensively in the last game, the Eagles were able to establish both a rushing and a passing game.

"We wanted at first to establish a run game, and then felt we could pass after that," he said.

This season, the Eagles seem to be well-balanced in both.

Against the Pirates, Eagle quarterback Nolan Hildebrand was 5-for-10, passing for 118 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. Hildebrand's longest of the night was a 67-yard touchdown pass to Dakota Oropeza in the third quarter. Hildebrand and Oropeza connected for a 53-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter as well.

On rushing the Eagles were equally successful, with 37 rushes for 200 yards as a team. Individually, Chad McGill's nine-yard touchdown run gave the Eagles their first goal in the first quarter.

Tyler Gray had a 31-yard interception return for a touchdown in the third quarter. Gray now leads his team in rushing with 71 rushes for 390 yards and six touchdowns.

Christian Gomez added the final touchdown on the ground for the Eagles in the fourth quarter off a 30-yard run.

As a team for the season, Hildebrand has gone 31-for-59 passing for 470 yards and seven touchdowns. On rushing, the Eagles have 191 carries for 1,244 yards and 15 touchdowns.

"It's important to be well-rounded so a team can't key on one thing or another, and be balanced," said Harper. "We're fortunate to have talented kids in a lot of key positions."

Defensively, the Eagles have given up on average only 14 points per game with the most, 38 points, given up during their loss to St. Joseph.

"We take a lot of pride in doing our best and being physical," he said.

With the win against the Pirates, the Eagles claimed ownership of the rivalry trophy for the duration of the year as well.

"There's a lot of pride involved in that, and we have a little rivalry that's been established," he said.

Tonight, the Eagles travel to Santa Maria to take on the Saints. The Saints are currently 2-3 overall, 0-2 LPL.

While the Saints have struggled over the last few years, going winless last season in both pre-league and league, Harper described a team that's undergone a few changes this year, with a new coach in Mike Regan, and the addition of some talented athletes to the team.

"They are under a new head coach and he does some things that can pose some problems for you, and we think they have more talent than they've had in the past, so we're not going to take the game lightly," he said.

"He's bringing some excitement to Santa Maria again, and he's very optimistic and upbeat, just a nice guy, and I think he's going to turn that program around."

The game starts at 7:30 p.m. at Santa Maria High School.

For the complete article see the 10-16-2009 issue.

Click here to purchase an electronic version of the 10-16-2009 paper.

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