CdM celebrates after winning the CIF Division 2 title Saturday night. (Photos courtesy John Luciano, For OC Sports Zone).
Corona del Mar’s girls flag football team may not have been one of the favorites to reach the CIF finals.
But the young Sea Kings over-achieved and capped a memorable playoff run by defeating Westlake 26-14 in the CIF Division 2 final Saturday night at Fred Kelly Stadium.
“I just couldn’t be more proud of this group,” said CdM Coach Theo Rokos. “We lost our quarterback (to graduation), my daughter (Alexa Rokos) that was hard to replace. But Addi Stern has done an amazing job ever since she stepped in. I could not be more proud of these girls.
“We have a list of B rules and our number one is believe and this group worked so hard from August until now. People wrote us off and thought we were dead. We knew if we could get in we could be dangerous.”
To see the slide show, click on the first photo:
As the coach indicated, sophomore quarterback Addison Stern led the way scoring on three touchdown runs and throwing a TD pass to Brooke Morris in the second quarter that put the Sea Kings ahead 20-7 at halftime on their way to a first CIF crown.
Stern, who passed for 144 yards and a touchdown and rushed for 62 yards and also made some big plays on defense, was jubilant.
“I’m so, so excited, it’s just a great feeling, since the beginning of the season we started off as a very young team with a whole new coaching staff and all freshmen practically, we lost all of our starterslast year,” said Stern, who became the starting quarterback in the middle of the season. “Going into the season, I didn’t expect us to get this far and then every CIF {playoff} win …. I was so excited we made it this far, it’s the best feeling ever.”
Stern’s 3-yard TD run in the first quarter gave the Sea Kings an early 7-0 lead.
But Westlake (17-7) tied the score 7-7 when Kate Janowicz hauled in a 28-yard TD pass from quarterback Annabel O’Keefe.
But the Sea Kings (18-14) were able to dominate the rest of the game with Stern scoring on TD runs of 2 and 6 yards and the TD catch by Morris.
—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com
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