La Cañada football shuts out Temple City in matchup of unbeatens

SAN MARINO — The La Cañada football team left nothing to chance Friday night and easily took care of the Temple City Rams.

The Spartans blanked one of the San Gabriel Valley’s top passing games and dominated Temple City in a 35-0 win in the opening game of the Rio Hondo League.

La Cañada gave Temple City (5-1, 0-1) its toughest test yet and the Spartans (6-0, 1-0) proved, especially on the defensive side of the ball, how dominant they can be. The Spartans defense anchored its performance Friday night and spoiled Temple City’s Homecoming night with three forced turnovers — two interceptions and a forced fumble — and three sacks.

“I thought our defensive line played outstanding and did a great job of getting to the quarterback,” La Cañada head football coach Dave Avramovich said. “Obviously (zero points) is a good score for defense. We got two hits on the quarterback on the first drive and we sent a message and kinda sent a message that we were going to be aggressive.”

The Spartans’ unrelenting defensive performance helped steady the offense after a sloppy first half. La Cañada sophomore quarterback Joe Bell led the way for the Spartans as he accounted for three touchdowns — two passing and a 53-yard touchdown run. Bell, who finished with 161 passing yards and 62 rushing yards, connected on two occasions with wideout Quest Swan.

Swan finished with 71 receiving yards.

The Spartans jumped out to a 14-0 lead and scored on its first two drives. Bell’s 18-yard touchdown pass and running back Jakob Kim’s 1-yard touchdown run seemed to be the beginning of the end for the Rams. But 50 penalty yards coupled with struggles to execute snaps to Bell successfully stifled offensive rhythm and kept the game within reach for Temple City.

But La Cañada’s stout defense shined in the first half and compensated for many of the Spartans’ unforced first-half errors — three fumbles because of high snaps, one of which wasn’t recovered. The Spartans’ pass rush gave the Rams’ pass attack its biggest test of the season by far, limiting Temple City to three first downs in the first half.

The Rams passing game, which is the seventh best in the San Gabriel Valley (total pass yards) heading into Friday’s game, mustered 91 total yards of offense in the first half and saw its five first-half drives end in three, three-and-outs, a fumble lost and an interception.

The lost fumble and interception came on two of Temple City’s only drives to reach inside the La Cañada 20-yard line.

“No points is very bad,” Temple City head football coach Riley Saxon said of coming up empty on two potential scoring drives. “The way it happened … is really deflating.”

Bell’s 53-yard touchdown run in the dying seconds of the first half gave the Spartans a 21-0 lead heading into halftime. Just before halftime, Rams starting quarterback

“I told (Leones), ‘If it’s 7-7 in the CIF championship game, you’re going in,’” Saxon said. “It was 21-0 and we wanted to see how the first two drives (went.)”

The Spartans scored 14 more points in the second half before handing the Rams a 35-point loss.