Carlsbad won big in their first game of the New Year in the Southern California school league, defeating San Clemente 52-12.
The game itself felt a lot closer than the score might indicate—San Clemente did well to test the Carlsbad defense and did find gaps to exploit.
However, in the end it was a relatively comfortable in for Carlsbad. Center Nathan Wilson was heavily represented on the scoresheet while Ray Taele showed well playing at both hooker and No. 8 (but not at the same time).
Meanwhile, in the Single-School league, we knew that Torrey Pines and Los Alamitos were likely the front-runners after they battled to a 15-12 Torrey Pines win in December. Well they backed that up with both teams winning by large margins over Servite (vs Los Al) and San Marcos (vs Torrey Pines).
Two non-conference games were on the slate with Loyola beating Long Beach Poly 46-10 and Orange Lutheran defeating John Muir 35-14.
Next week several of these teams will be at the Storer Classic at UCLA. Carlsbad will play Layton Christian out of Utah, and Orange Lutheran will also play a Utah opponent in Brighton. Carlsbad will also play NorCal's Danville. Rancho Cucamonga will play Brighton as well. Some of the SoCal clubs, which play their league season mostly in March and April, will take the field for the first time there.
