Two of this week’s honorees are Blayne Lowry of Nipomo (left) and Eiler King from San Juan Hills (SJ Capistrano). Photos: qbhitlist.com & Instagram.com.
Thanks to Harold Abend and Ronnie Flores for handling this feature for us while we were out of country for two weeks. We return and have six more top-flight players to be put in the spotlight. For Southern California, the honorees are from San Juan Capistrano, Agoura and Chino Hills. For Northern California, they’re from Nipomo, Palo Cedro and San Lorenzo.
We hope you enjoy this free post on CalHiSports.com. All regular season State TOP 50 rankings will be Gold Club posts. All of our exclusive state record lists also are for Gold Club only plus state record & state stat stars featurs. We are in our 48th season of covering California high school football. You can sign up today to get all of our Gold Club content right now for $4.99 per month, $12.99 for three months or $24.99 for one year. For details, CLICK HERE.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Offensive Player of the Week
Eiler King (San Juan Hills, SJ Capistrano) Sr.
For the last three seasons, the Stallions were led by quarterback Timmy Herr. He’s now at Saddleback College, but with King at the controls the team has been just as potent on offense.
In a 61-10 win over surprisingly winless Los Alamitos last week in San Juan Hills’ Alpha League opener, King came our firing and never cooled off. He ended 24 of 29 passing for 473 yards and seven touchdowns. Three of Eiler’s TD passes went to Luke Frith, the son of head coach Rob Frith. The seven TD passes is huge but it takes eight to get a listing in our all-time state records. The 473 yards, however, is a school record and just beats the 470-yard cutoff to be on that all-time state list.
King, who came over to San Juan Hills from JSerra, now has 1,459 yards passing on the season in helping the Stallions get out to a 5-1 record. Their only loss is to State TOP 50 ranked Chaparral of Temecula and they’ve scored 60 or more points in three straight games. They are playing Edison of Huntington Beach on Friday on the road.
Agoura’s George Hastings gestures to a camera man after scoring a touchdown during game last season. Photo: X.com.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Multi-Purpose/Special Teams Player of the Week
George Hastings (Agoura) Sr.
The info on George came in from prep editor Joe Curley of the Ventura County Star. He noted that George had one of his typical do-it-all type of games or the Chargers in a 55-37 win last week over Buena of Ventura.
Hastings, who was profiled by the L.A. Times two years ago as a sophomore for his multi-purpose skills, rushed four times for 111 yards and two TDs and he caught six passes for 102 yards and one score. Buena also had to deal with him on defense. Hastings helped the defense get just enough stops in the shootout with seven tackles and one pass deflection.
An Ivy League candidate with a 4.3 GPA, Hastings enters this week with 482 yards rushing with 173 yards receiving on the season and 783 total yards. On defense, he has 38 tackles and 4.5 tackles for loss.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Defensive Player of the Week
Turner O’Dell (Chino Hills) Sr.
He’s the younger brother of swimming star and 2025 State Girls Athlete of the Year Teagan O’Dell of Santa Margarita (now swimming at Virginia). He’s got the same first name as the last name of his famous coaching uncles, Norv Turner and Ron Turner, and he had a night to remember for Chino Hills in a 28-21 win last week over Damien of La Verne in the Huskies’ Baseline League opener.
O’Dell scored on a interception return early in the game to give Chino Hills a 14-0 lead. Then in the second half with Damien now down 21-7, Turner essentially iced the win by taking his second interception all the back for a touchdown.
Turner has played QB for Chino Hills as well, but the regular starter came back for the Damien game so he switched back to defense. In addition to the two pick six TDs, he also had five tackles.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Offensive Player of the Week
Blayne Lowry (Nipomo) Sr.
As a reminder, all players and teams from the CIF Central Section are considered Northern California for all of our individual honors and that includes those like Lowry from schools in San Luis Obispo County.
Nipomo took on Templeton last week in what figured to be an offensive scorefest. That’s what happened and Lowry is the one who had the biggest numbers in leading the Titans to a 48-42 victory. He completed 18 of 29 passes for 342 yards and five touchdowns. He also shined running the ball and had eight carries for 147 yards and two scores. That’s a combined total of 489 yards and seven touchdowns. With the win, Nipomo also pushed its season record to 6-0.
Lowry was a starting QB at Nipomo as a freshman and sophomore, but played last season at Paso Robles. He wasn’t able to play back at Nipomo until the fifth game due to transfer sit out rules. The game against Templeton was just his second of the season.
Tank De La Cruz from Foothill of Palo Cedro is making the most of his senior season after missing most of last season. Photo: Hudl.com.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Defensive Player of the Week
Tank De La Cruz (Foothill, Palo Cedro) Sr.
From way down south in San Luis Obispo County, we are going way up north near Redding to find this week’s NorCal winner for defense. Tank had contacted us himself a few days ago to see if we could watch his tape. What we did do is check out his stats and it turned out to be a good week to write up the 6-foot-3, 250-pound defensive end who has an offer from Southern Utah.
In a 37-14 win last Friday vs McLane of Fresno, De La Cruz, who also goes by Tank Leonidas De La Cruz, came up with 12 tackles with three of those for loss. He also scored one of the Cougars’ touchdowns on a 7-yard run. De La Cruz came up with 10 tackles and two sacks in his previous outing, which came in a 50-33 triumph against Lassen of Susanville.
Tank also plays tight end and could be considered in the “athlete” category. He has a 3.76 GPA.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Special Teams/Multi-Purpose Player of the Week
Tyrel Mauia (San Lorenzo) Jr.
For impressive offense-defense stats from last week, clearly one of the best totals we saw came in for Mauia, a 5-foot-7, 180-pound junior from the East Bay region of the CIF North Coast Section.
Mauia shined on offense with 21 carries for 276 yards and five touchdowns to lead the Grizzlies in their 41-6 rout of Hayward Mt. Eden. But that’s not all. On defense, it wasn’t the nine tackles that stood out but that seven of them were reported as being for loss.
So far this season in five games for his 3-2 team, Tyrel has rushed for 903 yards and 13 touchdowns. He has 22 tackles on defense with 11 for loss and one caused fumble.
Mark Tennis is the co-founder and publisher of CalHiSports.com. He can be reached at markjtennis@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow Mark on the Cal-Hi Sports Twitter handle: @CalHiSports
