Former USC, NFL standout Carson Palmer hired as football coach at Santa Margarita

• December 12, 2024

Former NFL and USC quarterback Carson Palmer has been hired as the football head coach at Santa Margarita High, where Palmer was quarterback and an All-Orange County player as a senior in the 1997 season.

Palmer replaces Anthony Rouzier, who was placed on administrative leave in October following allegations of student misbehavior in a school locker room. Defensive coordinator Steve Fifita was promoted to head coach.

Rouzier coached the Eagles for five seasons.

Santa Margarita this season finished 5-7 overall and 1-4 in the Trinity League.

Palmer won the Heisman Trophy at USC in 2002.

More details to come. 

​ Orange County Register 

How potential Medicaid cuts could play out in California

• December 12, 2024

By Bernard Wolfson | KFF Health News

In 2017, the Republicans who controlled Congress tried mightily to slash federal spending on Medicaid, the government-funded health program covering low-income families and individuals.

California, like other states, depends heavily on federal dollars to provide care for its poorest residents. Analyzes at the time showed the GOP’s proposals would cut Medicaid funds flowing from Washington by tens of billions of dollars, perhaps even more, forcing state officials to rethink the scope of Medi-Cal.

But the GOP efforts ended in failure — iconically crystallized by Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, sick with terminal brain cancer, issuing his decisive early-morning thumbs-down.

More than seven years later, here we go again.

With Donald Trump preparing to reenter the White House, bolstered once more by Republican majorities in both houses of Congress, expectations are high that the GOP will quickly resurrect its long-desired goal of cutting Medicaid.

Republicans want to finance large tax cuts, and the GOP platform under Trump pledges not to touch Social Security or Medicare. To be sure, that’s not set in stone. But for now, as my KFF colleagues have noted, Medicaid looks an awful lot like low-hanging fruit. (KFF is a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News.)

Health officials in California and across the nation are on edge about the possibility of large-scale Medicaid cuts being enacted as soon as next year. Such cuts would have an outsize impact in the Golden State, whose 14.7 million Medi-Cal enrollees exceed the entire populations of all but three other US states. Medi-Cal provides health coverage for over 40% of the state’s children and pays for nearly 40% of births. It is a crucial source of funding for safety net hospitals and community clinics.

And over 60% of its $161 billion budget this year comes via Washington.

The potential for big federal cuts to Medicaid may have been a factor in Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s decision to call a special session of the state legislature this week.

California could seek to offset a sharp drop in federal dollars with higher taxes or cuts to other state programs. But both those options could be politically untenable. That’s why many health experts think leaders in Sacramento would almost certainly have to consider shrinking Medi-Cal.

That could mean cutting any number of optional benefits , such as dental services, optometry, and physical therapy. It might also mean rolling back some of the ambitious Medi-Cal expansion you have undertaken in recent years. That could include some aspects of California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal, a $12 billion program of services that address patients’ social and economic needs in addition to their medical needs.

Some observers fear federal cuts could affect the approximately 1.5 million immigrants living in the US without authorization who are enrolled in Medi-Cal at an annual cost of over $6 billion, nearly all of it funded by the state. But others say a more likely route would be to reduce payments across the board to the managed care plans that cover 94% of Medi-Cal enrollees, rather than target any specific groups of people.

“Medicaid is on the chopping block, and I don’t think that’s speculation,” says Gerald Kominski, a senior fellow at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research. “It is widely viewed by potential members of Trump’s administration as a program that is too broad and needs to be brought under control.”

Whether they can succeed this time remains to be seen. But more on that later.

People who have followed previous GOP efforts to downsize Medicaid say a variety of previously attempted methods might be back on the table this time. They could include outright caps on federal Medicaid dollars; elimination of the core Affordable Care Act policy under which the feds pay 90% of the cost of expanding coverage to a wider swath of low-income adults; a work requirement, which could depress enrollment; and rule changes intended to make it harder for states to draw federal Medicaid dollars through the use of taxes on health care insurers known as MCOs.

The first Trump administration proposed but later dropped changes to the rules governing such taxes. If similar changes were adopted this time around, they could cause financial headaches in California, which has frequently used MCO taxes to offset Medi-Cal spending from state coffers.

Proposition 35, recently passed by California voters, could also be at risk. The initiative calls for the MCO tax to become a permanent fixture in 2027, pending federal approval, with the goal of financing billions of dollars in new Medi-Cal spending, primarily to increase funding for doctors and other providers. A federal rule change could upend those intentions.

Termination of the federal government’s 90% coverage of the ACA Medicaid expansion would put a gaping hole in the Medi-Cal budget. Medi-Cal spent over $34 billion in fiscal year 2023 covering the roughly 5 million people who enrolled as a result of the expansion, and nearly $31 billion of that amount was paid by the federal government.

If the feds’ share dropped back to its regular Medi-Cal rate of 50%, California would have to pony up nearly $14 billion more to keep the expansion enrollees covered — and that’s just for a year.

A more ambitious GOP push, including both spending caps and a rollback of federal support for the Medicaid expansion, could really send California officials scrambling.

In 2017, the state’s Department of Health Care Services issued an analysis showing that a legislative proposal filed by a group of Republican U.S. senators to cap Medicaid spending and end enhanced funding for the ACA expansion, along with some other cuts, would result in nearly $139 billion of lost federal funding to California from 2020 to 2027.

“There are almost limitless changes state leaders could make to Medi-Cal if they are forced to do that,” says David Kane, a senior attorney at the Western Center on Law & Poverty. “And we fear that burden will almost certainly hurt poor people and immigrants the most.”

But big Medicaid cuts are not a foregone conclusion. After all, when Trump was in the White House in 2017, Republicans also had House and Senate majorities and still did not achieve their goal. The political stars could be aligning differently this time, but the GOP has only a razor-thin majority in the House.

A decade into the ACA’s Medicaid expansion, some 21 million people across the country have coverage through it, embedding the program more deeply in the nation’s health care landscape. According to a 2023 study from Georgetown University, Medicaid and the related Children’s Health Insurance Program cover a higher proportion of the population in rural counties than in urban ones. And as we know, rural America leans strongly Republican.

Will GOP members of Congress, faced with a vote on cutting Medicaid, buck their own constituents?

Edwin Park, one of the authors of that Georgetown study, thinks there’s a chance big cuts can be noticed. “Large numbers of Americans are either on Medicaid, have family members on Medicaid, or know someone on Medicaid,” says Park, a research professor at Georgetown’s McCourt School of Public Policy. “Hopefully its popularity and its importance will win the day.”

“Asking Never Hurts” is a series of columns by Bernard J. Wolfson addressing the challenges consumers face in California’s health care landscape.

This article was produced by KFF Health News , which publishes California Healthline , an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation .

​ Orange County Register 

Three men file sexual assault suits against Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, adding to dozens of claims

• December 12, 2024

Sean “Diddy” Combs was accused by three more men of rape and sexual assault in lawsuits filed in Manhattan on Thursday, adding to dozens of disturbing allegations against the jailed hip-hop mogul. 

The suits accuse Combs, who just turned 55, of drugging and sexually assaulting men as recently as 2022. 

A man who says he met Combs through an associate alleges he fell victim “to one or more criminal sex acts” by Combs and his entourage between 2020 and 2022. He alleges that at a summer party at Combs’ East Hampton mansion in 2020, a few drinks rendered him unconscious, and he spent the night fading “in and out of consciousness” as Combs and his associates took turns anally raping him. 

Another one of the men, who says he first met Combs in 2006 when he was hired to run errands for him, alleges he was drugged and raped by Combs in February 2020 after an assistant for the larger-than-life recording executive set up a meeting at the InterContinental hotel in Times Square to discuss money he was owed for jobs. 

When the man arrived at Combs’ suite, nobody was there but Combs, who urged him to drink with him, the suit alleges. Combs’ former errands assistant alleges he became excessively tired and fell asleep on the couch, later waking up to find himself on his stomach and bent over while Combs sodomized him. 

When he tried to resist, the man claims Combs told him to “stop” and said he was “almost done.” The victim threatened to call the police, and Combs told him he’d “look like an idiot” if he did so, the suit alleges. 

A third man says he met Combs in 2019 at Marquee nightclub on 10th Ave. near W. 27th St. through a club promoter friend, Andrew. The man alleges Combs’ security guards invited him to Combs’ afterparty at the Park Hyatt hotel on W. 57th St. near 7th Ave.

After arriving and drinking half a cocktail Combs prepared Combs allegedly ushered him and others into the bedroom, when the victim’s suit says the room “started spinning.” 

The suit alleges the victim told Combs he felt unwell, and Combs told him to sit down before telling others present that he was “ready to party.” He similarly describes falling in and out of consciousness and waking to Combs raping him. 

“During [a] brief moment of consciousness, plaintiff noticed that while he was being sexually assaulted by [Combs] on the sectional sofa, there was a man and a woman sitting on the bed recording the rape on a camera,” the suit reads.

When the victim awoke the following day, Combs was gone, and people who had been recording the assault handed him $2,500 in cash, the suit claims.

The suits, all filed by anonymous John Does in state Supreme Court in Manhattan, seek unspecified damages and name Combs, Bad Boy Entertainment, Sony and various business entities associated with the mogul as defendants. The cases were filed under New York City’s Gender-Motivated Violence Protection Act, and they list multiple claims, including sexual assault, sexual battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Defense attorney Thomas Giuffra represents the three men. He could not be reached for comment.

The suits add to nearly 40 brought against the prolific hip-hop producer by men and women alleging sexual assault and drugging incidents dating back decades. One outstanding civil case recently accused rapper Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter of raping a 13-year-old girl with Combs in 2000, which Carter has vehemently denied.

They come as Combs awaits trial on sex trafficking charges carrying a potential decades-long sentence at Brooklyn’s federal jail after repeated failed attempts to be released on a $50 million bond.

In his criminal case, Combs is accused of using his vast business empire to facilitate the sexual abuse and coercion of women he drugged and forced to participate in violent sexual performances dubbed “freak offs.” 

The Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office alleges Combs recorded the depraved abuse sessions for blackmail purposes and that he and associates engaged in forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery, and obstruction of justice. He has pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and interstate transportation to engage in prostitution.

Disturbing allegations against Combs first exploded into public view in November 2023, when his ex-partner, R&B singer Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, accused him in a lawsuit demanding $30 million of “savage” beatings, drugging her, and forcing her to sleep with other men. Combs settled the suit the next day. The following May, CNN published footage of Combs violently assaulting Ventura at a Manhattan hotel in 2016, prompting him to apologize publicly.

Reached for comment Thursday, a representative for Combs said, “These complaints are full of lies. We will prove them false and seek sanctions against every unethical lawyer who filed fictional claims against him.”

​ Orange County Register 

Clippers getting Ivica Zubac’s best every night

• December 12, 2024

INGLEWOOD — Clippers center Ivica Zubac leads the league in total rebounds with 304, nearly half of what he pulled down all of last season – impressive but unexplainable for the 7-footer now in his eighth NBA season.

“I don’t know,” the big man said of his increased production this season. “I’m more, I don’t know, I’m out there for longer.”

Others, however, have a better idea. Coach Tyronn Lue said the Clippers have changed their defensive schemes under assistant coach Jeff Van Gundy, which keeps Zubac closer to the basket and not roaming the key.

“That way he’s able to get rebounds and keeping our biggest guy around the rim is really good for us,” Lue said. “So, we’ve really done a good job of just trying to keep size on the size, not letting Zu be out of position and then make sure he’s able to finish the possession with a rebound.”

Zubac’s reaction?

“Could be, yeah,” said Zubac, who had 626 total rebounds last season.

Zubac is averaging 12.2 rebounds to go along with 14.8 points per game, both career highs, not only from his touches inside, but also in part to the solid chemistry he has developed with teammate James Harden. As Harden’s partner in pick-and-rolls, Zubac is getting more opportunities to find the basket.

Yet it’s his rebounding that stands out. He is fourth in the NBA in rebounding average, behind only Denver Nuggets star Nikola Jokic (13.6), Karl-Anthony Towns (13.6) of the New York Knicks, and Sacramento Kings center Domantas Sabonis (12.7).

Zubac will again test his skills against the league’s best when the Clippers (14-11) face the Nuggets (12-10) on Friday night at Ball Arena. The Clippers will be looking for their third victory against the 2023 NBA champions.

With Paul George gone after signing a free-agent deal with the Philadelphia 76ers and Kawhi Leonard sidelined, Zubac started the year in dominant fashion, averaging 22.3 points and 12.0 rebounds while shooting 63.3% from the field. After a 23-point, 18-rebound performance against the Golden State Warriors in October, Zubac became the first Clippers center to log three consecutive 20-point games to start a season since Bob McAdoo in 1975.

“You have to produce while you’re out there,” Zubac said. “I feel like I can’t let my guys down. We’re, I think, a smaller team than most of the teams that we play, and I got to do my part on the boards. So, that’s a thing we struggled a lot with last year and a lot of it, it’s on me. I still think I can be better.”

Zubac has pulled down double-digit boards in 12 of the Clippers’ last 13 games, recording eight double-doubles over that stretch and averaging 13.5 points, 12.1 rebounds, 2.2 assists and 0.9 blocks while shooting 62.6% from the floor.

“I think he’s more aggressive,” veteran forward Nico Batum said. “He knows he is a big man. He’s going to be on the court for 35, 40 minutes, so we need him to get all the ball. You can really rely on him to get every ball though, but he knows he has to dominate that part every night. So, he’s doing a good job so far.”

Lue wasn’t sure about the aggressive part, but he did know one thing.

“I don’t know about that, but he’s gotten better,” Lue said.

CLIPPERS AT NUGGETS

When: Friday, 6 p.m.

Where: Ball Arena, Denver

TV/radio: FDSNSC/570 AM

​ Orange County Register 

Avelino Valencia launches 2026 bid for state Senate seat

• December 12, 2024

Avelino Valencia, who just started his second term in the Assembly, is eyeing a move to the other side of the Capitol.

With the 2024 election all but over, the Anaheim Democrat is looking ahead to 2026, launching a bid for the 34th state Senate district on Thursday, Dec., 12, his campaign first shared with the Southern California News Group. The seat is represented by Sen. Tom Umberg, D-Santa Ana, who cannot run again due to term limits.

“This district is where I was born and raised, where I met my wife, where I coached student athletes, where I served as a city council member and Assemblymember and where I’ll always call home,” Valencia said in a statement.

“As a public servant, I have had the chance to make a difference in the lives of my neighbors,” he continued. “I am running for state Senate because I know it will provide an even greater opportunity to deliver results for our community. I’ll work hard every day to improve schools, build housing, reduce costs and empower working familes.”

Valencia, a former Anaheim council member, was first elected in 2022 to the Assembly, where he has served on the Joint Legislative Budget Committee as well as the Arts, Entertainment, Sports and Tourism; Governmental Organization; Insurance; Military and Veterans Affairs committees.

In the legislature, he has advocated for independent local redistricting and transparency in municipal government. He has also championed legislation to increase transparency in alcohol and drug programs and prevent gun violence.

The son of immigrants and a first-generation college graduate, Valencia has described himself as a “pragmatic progressive who listens and finds common ground.” He was a district director for former Assemblymember Tom Daly, a former Fullerton College football coach and was the first millennial to represent Orange County in the legislature, his campaign said in 2022.

SD-34 spans Los Angeles and Orange counties, centering on Anaheim but including communities in Buena Park, Fullerton, La Habra and Santa Ana.

It’s a fairly blue district. Democrats make up 46.75% of registered voters in SD-34, according to the secretary of state’s latest report on Oct. 21, while Republicans account for 24.02% and no party preference 22.36%.

Avelino, in the election held last month, cruised to victory in his re-election bid for the 68th Assembly district seat, besting Republican businessman Mike Tardif with 63.7% of the vote. (The secretary of state will certify the election results by Friday, Dec. 13.)

Umberg, who chairs the Senate’s Judiciary Committee, joined the upper chamber in 2018 after multiple stints in the Assembly.

​ Orange County Register 

Fryer: Tournaments provide fundraising and fun for basketball teams

• December 12, 2024

The two basketball teams battled for 48 minutes and then went to In-N-Out together.

It’s tournament time in Orange County basketball, the only time of the season when that sort of thing happens.

The San Juan Hills Invitational is one of the boys basketball tournaments this week. It is being played at host schools Capistrano Valley Christian and San Juan Hills. After San Juan Hills beat Damalan College Prep of Australia, the teams headed to a nearby In-N-Out for a postgame feast.

Tournaments are important fundraisers for the host schools. Jon Bahnsen has run many tournaments in his eight seasons as the coach at Capistrano Valley Christian and his 20 years previously at Brethren Christian. He said teams pay a $475 fee to play in the San Juan Invitational. Spectator admission and snack bar revenue create needed income.

“Tournaments offset our costs when we travel to other tournaments like in Palms Springs or Las Vegas,” Bahnsen said. “I take a lot of pride in running a quality tournament. This year we have a team from the CIF Los Angeles City Section, two from the San Diego Section and two teams from Australia.”

Getting officials for a tournament is not a problem. Teams that rescind their commitments to a tournament can be.

“That’s getting worse and worse,” Bahnsen said. “Even after contracts are signed coaches back out of their commitment. At one time we had 16 teams and we were hoping to make a 16-team bracket but then it came down to the 12 teams we have.”

The Orange Holiday Classic boys basketball tournament will be played for the 59th time this season, making it the longest-running tournament in Orange County. It goes from Dec. 26-30 at Orange High, and this time it has eight boys teams and eight girls teams.

Another veteran tournament in boys basketball is the Coast Classic, Dec. 26-30 at Estancia High. This will be the 39th season for that one, and this year it has 16 teams broken into two eight-team divisions. It also charges $475 for teams.

“Thankfully, we have been very lucky at Estancia to be able to hold this great tournament over the years with little to no issues,” Estancia coach Xavier Castellano said via email. “Not only are we able to host some great basketball teams, coaches, players and games in our gym but we are also able to raise funds that will help support our program.”

And a side trip for a Double-Double might be a bonus. Grilled onions, please.

NOTES

• The semifinals of the North Orange County Championships boys basketball tournament at Sonora on Friday: Pacifica Christian vs. Pilibos, 6 p.m.; Canyon vs. Etiwanda, 7:30 p.m. The tournament championship game is Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Sonora. …

• Los Alamitos hosts the two-day Los Alamitos Varsity Showcase event Friday and Saturday. Friday’s schedule has St. Pius X-St. Matthias vs. Los Alamitos at 7 p.m. Those are two of the better teams in the CIF Southern Section. …

• The Maya Enomoto Showcase on Saturday at Esperanza has several outstanding girls basketball matchups including Brentwood vs. Orange County No. 14 Esperanza at 6 p.m. and county No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 3 Sage Hill at 7:30 p.m. …

• The 25th annual Orange County North/South Challenge is Dec. 21 at Tesoro, with the first game at 9 a.m. and the final game at 7:30 p.m. Its final two games are great matchups: San Clemente vs. Los Alamitos, 6 p.m. and San Juan Hills vs. Cypress, 7:30 p.m. …

• The Tustin Holiday Classic is another long-running boys basketball tournament. It goes from Dec. 26-30 at Tustin High. Teams in it include Edison, Newport Harbor and Tesoro. …

• El Dorado won the Gary Raya Classic boys basketball tournament last week with a 66-63 win over Yorba Linda in the final. El Dorado’s Caleb Hendrix was named tourney MVP. …

• Newport Harbor beat Tustin 61-60 in the Euclid Extravaganza boys basketball tournament championship game. Newport Harbor’s Jack Berry was named tournament MVP. Berry also is a standout volleyball player. …

• Buy parking in advance if you’re going to the CIF State Championships football games at Saddleback College. The $5 fee can be paid here. …

• Not too many names in the CIF-SS record book pop up as both athlete and coach, but Lance Stewart’s name does. He was the CIF volleyball player of the year in 1981 and coached Corona del Mar’s girls volleyball team to CIF section and state championships in 1992 and ‘93 and coached Laguna Beach’s girls volleyball team to CIF-SS titles in 2006 and ‘07. “Stewey,” also an outstanding football player, passed away a few days ago, age 61. A GoFundMe page was established to help the family with medical costs. …

• Servite’s soccer team did well against two outstanding opponents this week. The Friars tied Aliso Niguel 0-0 on Monday, defeated Valencia 4-2 on Wednesday. …

• Fairmont’s hockey teams is 9-1-1 and in first place in Division 1 of the Anaheim Ducks High School Hockey League. The Huskies’ leading points-getter is Cole Bieksa who has 16 points off of two goals and 14 assists. He is the son of former Duck and Fairmont coach Kevin Bieksa. Orange Lutheran’s Cole Kostanian is the leading scorer among Orange County teams with 10 goals and 13 assists for 23 points. …

• The CIF Southern Section will have its own weekly TV show:  “CIF Southern Section This Week.” It premieres Saturday, 7:30 p.m. on Spectrum SportsNet. CIF-SS communications coordinator Taylor Martinez will host the program. …

• Fifteen or 16 football games is too much for high school athletes. Yeah, high school kids want to keep playing but sometimes high school kids don’t make the greatest decisions. If someone told my parents to let 17-year-old me do whatever I want, my parents would have disagreed.

​ Orange County Register 

Edward Snowden deserves a pardon more than Hunter Biden

• December 12, 2024

If you had the power to save your son from 17 years of incarceration for crimes like lying on a gun purchase form and tax evasion, you would almost certainly wield that power.

But, if there were a national election taking place where this could be a talking point used against your party, maybe you would wait until after the election. To maintain the perception of moral and professional righteousness, you would probably insist that you would not be pardoning your son.

Joe Biden’s decision to pardon Hunter Biden is everything that everyone has said about it: it’s an abuse of power for personal gain, it undermines the perception of fairness in the justice system and it contributes to the normalization of presidents corrupting the purpose of the pardon.

It’s also a decision that we should find it difficult to blame him for. Biden had many competing duties to consider while deliberating on whether to pardon Hunter.

As president, he had a duty to use his power impartially.

As a father, he had no choice but to save his son. In fact, if he stood by his principles, he could be blamed for being excessively moralistic when he had the opportunity to spare his loved one. Arguably, he had a duty to protect his family and he weighed it similarly to how many of us would.

Republicans and Trump supporters may be tempted to point to Biden’s clemency as a demonstration of a lack of principles and a vindication of their criticism of Biden as a corrupt politician — he did lie, after all.

For years Biden has fashioned himself as a principled adherent to propriety as a contrast to Trump’s profile.

They are correct to point out that this appears to defeat at least some of Biden’s self-attributions of virtue but there is also some hypocrisy there. Trump would pardon the tentacled aliens that blew up the White House in Independence Day if it aligned with his personal interests.

In his statement, Biden justified his decision by claiming that his son has been unfairly targeted by his political opposition: “No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son — and that is wrong.”

Well, many reasonable people have indeed looked at the facts of the case and have reasonably concluded that Hunter was not unfairly targeted but instead may have received privileged treatment. If the power to pardon is best used when a miscarriage of justice has occurred, this wasn’t an example of that. Hunter wasn’t failed by the justice system despite what Biden claims, and this is unlike what has happened to many nameless Americans.

If Biden is going to abuse his power to benefit his own family, then we should at least get something in return. There are federally incarcerated individuals who are genuine victims of miscarriages of justice.

There are those who had the misfortune of committing their crimes during the ‘80s and ‘90s when the war on drugs was in full force, leading many of them to receive disproportionately harsh sentences.

The draconian mandatory minimums of the time saw people like Michelle West receive life sentences for first-time drug offenses.

On behalf of the government, Biden should also apologize to and pardon Edward Snowden so that he can return to his family. Snowden did us all a great service by exposing the government’s secret programs to illegally and unconstitutionally spy on us.

Among others, Snowden revealed the existence of PRISM, a mass surveillance program used by the NSA to indiscriminately collect our private communications, violating the Fourth Amendment.

Snowden sacrificed everything to bring to light the abuses of the federal intelligence agencies. He is an American hero who showed us how easily our government is willing to violate our personal freedoms. He did so at the great cost of leaving his home country and his loved ones behind. There is no evidence that his actions harmed anyone, which makes his continued exile all the more unjustified.

Joe Biden’s pardoning of Hunter was an ethically ambiguous decision, so the least he can do is extend that same mercy to the thousands of others who are more deserving.

Rafael Perez is a columnist for the Southern California News Group. You can reach him at [email protected].

​ Orange County Register 

Los Alamitos football flattened by Murrieta Valley in Division 2 quarterfinals

• November 16, 2024

LOS ALAMITOS – The Los Alamitos football team was looking to add another nightmare chapter to MurrietaValley’s postseason story. But the Nighthawks, who finished second in CIF-SS Division 2 last season, served notice about 90 seconds into the game that it was their night to crush dreams.

The Nighthawks (10-2) rushed for 336 yards, and quarterback Bear Bachmeier accounted for 255 yardsand three touchdowns for a 49-28 victory over the Griffins on Friday in the Division 2 quarterfinals at Los Alamitos High.

“There was no turning point,” Griffins coach Ray Fenton said. “That’s a really good football team, and there’s a reason they’re the No. 1 seed.”

Bachmeier connected with Julian Treadwell for a 49-yard touchdown pass on the third play of the game. TheGriffins (6-6) recovered from that punch a few minutes later when Alonzo Esparza hit Lenny Ibarra for a 40-yardtouchdown at the midway mark of the quarter.

Murrieta Valley responded by scoring on its next three possessions, the last when Bachmeier’s 1-yard TD rungave the Nighthawks a 28-7 lead with 3:32 left in the first half.

Esparza and Ibarra responded again, with Ibarra pulling in a 41-yard touchdown with 1:29 left in the half.

“Our kids played hard,” Fenton said. “They played well on both sides of the ball.”

Esparza passed for 301 yards and three touchdowns, but the Nighthawks made him work for every yard. Hecompleted 20 of 32 passes, but it was rarely easy.

“We wanted to keep it simple and play fast,” Murrieta Valley coach George Wilson said. “We have some reallytalented players in the secondary. We’ve played some good teams this year, and I think that prepared them forthis.”

The defensive scheme was fairly simple, Fenton said: Swarm the secondary with defenders and force Esparzaout of the pocket to try to find an open receiver somewhere.

“They dropped eight guys in coverage and rushed three, so there aren’t a lot of holes back there,” Fentonsaid. “I thought Alonzo did a great job of being patient and finding guys back there.”

Ibarra caught three balls for 97 yards and Tron Baker caught five balls for 87 yards. Tight end Beckham Hoflandshowed why he may be the primary target of opposing defenses next season, making several athletic catches enroute to six receptions for 78 yards.

“The tight end coach from Texas Tech said they consider him a top-two tight end in the country, which iswhy they’ve offered him a scholarship,” Fenton said of Hofland, a 6-foot-5, 225-pound junior.

Los Alamitos could not complement Esparza with a solid run game, as Murrieta Valley held the Griffins to 82yards on the ground.

​ Orange County Register