Sea Kings Sink Peninsula to Claim Bay League Championship

In the fight for the Bay League Title, the Palos Verdes Sea Kings showed Thursday afternoon they were in no mood to share.

“We challenged our guys this week," football head coach Guy Gardner said. "We said, 'Either you can share this title, or you can win it outright' and our guys showed that apparently they wanted it.”

And did they ever, with a final 35-3 score against rival . Click here to view a photo gallery of the game's highlights.

The Sea Kings scored a touchdown on their opening drive as tailback Sal Vitale put Palos Verdes ahead 7-0.

“It’s always big for us to score on the first drive. It sets the tone for us and shows the defense that we are dangerous,” Palos Verdes quarterback Zack Fixen said.

The Sea Kings flexed their offensive muscles and did what they do best—run the football.

Palos Verdes (8-2, 5-0) scored on all four of their first-half possessions and all via the ground.

Fixen was the main beneficiary with three rushing scores in the half.

“Everyone else did the dirty work and I got to make it look easy,” Fixen said.

Fixen scored two of his touchdowns from one yard out and went 15 yards on a bootleg just before half with 52 seconds remaining to give the Sea Kings a commanding 28-0 lead.

“You never know what’s going to happen against a rival," Gardner said. "It was nice to see our guys take control from the beginning.”

While Peninsula's defense was unable to provide much resistance to the Palos Verdes run game, the offense had troubles of their own.

“They are a great team, they will go far in the playoffs," Peninsula quarterback Matt Imwalle said. "We just didn’t come out and play well.”

The Panthers (5-5, 1-4) benefited from numerous Palos Verdes penalties (11 infractions for 130 yards) throughout the game, but were unable to translate that to points.

With just over three minutes remaining in the half, Peninsula had a false start on the Palos Verdes one-yard line.

“We fought as hard as we can," Peninsula head coach Adam Boyd said. "We’re happy with the effort, not happy with the result.”

An unsuccessful third down attempt yielded an unsuccessful fake field goal attempt in which holder Ian Escutia’s throw was intercepted in the end zone by Palos Verdes' Robby Kolanz.

“I saw it the whole way. We knew they needed a big play and I just made a play on it,” Kolanz said.

Reserve running back Carl Aguirre led the Sea Kings with 109 rushing yards and Vitale joined him in the century club with 101 yards of his own.

“Hats off to PV. They are very stout up front, they do what they do very well,” Boyd said.

Fixen added 44 yards rushing to go along with 86 yards on 5-8 passing.

“In the playoffs, we are going to keep going with our run game, that’s what we do, but we can mix in more passes when we need to,” Fixen said.

While the Panthers' season is over, they improved from last season’s two-win campaign to a respectable 5-5 mark.

“I’m very proud of our seniors," Boyd said. "The guys in front of them didn’t show them how to win. We have 18 seniors that taught our young guys how to win. They took us out of the cellar and all credit goes to them.”

Kolanz, a senior, has thought about what Thursday's win might feel like for some time.

“Words can’t describe how happy I am," he said. "Bay League Champions is something I’ve dreamed of for I don’t know how long."