La Costa Canyon made something of a statement this past weekend with a 40-12 defeat of Torrey Pines in the Southern California Varsity Red conference.

The Varsity Red features teams from the San Diego area with 100% of their players from a single school.

In this game, Torrey Pines sought to assert a physical advantage with their bigger forward pack, but the experience LCC backline was a little more polished. Torrey Pines had the lion’s share of possession with Ben Ruffolo, Cole Maes-Valley, and Nick Zimmer doing good work up front. 

But it was La Costa Canyon that opened the scoring when flyhalf Justin Petersen took a quick tap penalty and sent it wide to Sean Lumkong, who drew his man and passed to speedster Jon Ditto. The wing did the rest and touched down in the corner for a 5-0 lead.

From the restart Torrey Pines kept it tight in the forwards and enjoyed all the possession for about 15 minutes. A clever lineout throw from Zimmer to Maes-Valley set up Zimmer to get the return feed and power through for a try to tie up the game.

But eventually LCC got the ball back, and another quick tap from Peterson once again set up Ditto for a try in the corner.

This time, Lumkong bounced the kick off the left upright and through to make it 12-5 for LCC. Torrey Pines responded once more by exerting a tight grip on possession, and using the big forwards to make ground. A series of pick-and-goes finally opened up the lane for Ruffalo to bust through for a try under the posts. The kick was good and the game was tied 12-12 at halftime.

From the start of the second half it was clear that LCC intended to move the ball wide at every opportunity. Within five minutes, the La Costa players opted to run the ball out of their own 22. Big inside center Connor Braidic drew two defenders before offloading to Lumkong, who hit the hole and rambled for 60 meters before being hauled down. Torrey Pines scrambled well in defense, and stole the ball, possibly saving a try.

Torrey Pines worked their way back into LCC territory and flyhalf Matthew Goena popped a nifty chip kick over the defense; LCC’s Patrick French dove to make a tough catch. Pines surged on and earned a scrum, setting up a prime try-scoring opportunity. But La Costa Canyon held firm, defended the attack, thanks in large part to the work of hooker Victory Epstein, and got the ball back. From that turnover the backs set off, and after a high tackle penalty, Peterson sent a long pass out to Lumkong who galloped in. Lumkong then slotted the difficult kick to put LCC in the lead.

From the restart, the LCC backline made significant ground moving the ball through the hands, and were able to force a penalty. This time it was French’s turn to tap quickly, and he offloaded to Ethan Smith who raced around the blind side to score.

LCC was well and truly in the lead now at 24-12. Torrey Pines had two scoring opportunities with a lineout, and then a scrum, deep in LCC territory. But they came away with nothing, and then a kick to touch rolled through the dead ball line, and that gave La Costa Canyon a scrum near halfway, turning the momentum once more. Petersen popped a nice cross-field kick over the defenders’ heads and it bounced nicely for Ditto to gather and score. Lumkong again hit the tough conversion, and then LCC attacked again with Peterson setting up Lumkong under the posts. The kick was good and LCC had an impressive victory 40-12.

Scrumhalf Patrick French was outstanding for La Costa Canyon, especially in defense.

Also in SoCal Varsity Red, Cathedral defeated Del Norte 61-20, while St. Augustine defeated defending champs Fallbrook 36-22.