Villa Park Rallies to Beat Canyon

John Henry Jackson threw for 231 yards and three touchdowns as Villa Park defeated Canyon, 31-14, Thursday night in a Century League game at El Modena High.

Jackson completed 12 of 14 passes, with touchdowns of 54 and 45 yards to Adam Stayberg and an eight-yard completion to Bryan Arguello.

It didn’t look good early in the game for the Spartans. Canyon (3-5, 0-3) silenced the Villa Park home crowd on the first drive on the game when sophomore quarterback Brad Lusk broke through the middle and raced 59 yards for a score and a 7-0 lead with 9 minutes 39 seconds remaining in the first quarter.

The ninth-ranked Spartans (8-0, 3-0) came back on their first drive, as Jonathan Allmond swept around end on the second play and took the ball 45 yards to the Comanches’ 20-yard line. However, Houston Williams fumbled on the next play, ending the threat.

Things got worse for Villa Park before they got better. After the fumble the Spartans lost senior defensive lineman Jason Phillips with a possible fracture to his right leg, leaving an already thin line thinner. Salvador Solorzano broke his leg in last week’s game against Orange. Later in the first quarter senior defensive end Scott Koenig left the game with a sprained ankle.

“I was a bit concerned,” Spartan Coach Pat Mahoney said. “We were getting dinged up inside and then all the sudden we were losing. But the kids came back.”

Jackson tied the score, 7-7, with 1:26 left in the first, when he threw the ball 46 yards down the sideline to Stayberg, who had his defender beat by two steps.

From that point on it was all Villa Park, which led 10-7 at the half after a 37-yard field goal by Arguello.

After a turnover on their opening drive of the second quarter, the Spartans scored on their next three drives.

Allmond extended the lead to 17-7 with an eight-yard run midway through the third quarter.