A come-from-behind-win against a ranked team from the Southern Section resulted in coach Troy Starr’s Helix Highlanders landing 15th in Cal-Hi Sports‘  State Top 25 this week.

Oceanside is 16th, Mission Hills 21st, and St. Augustine is “On the Bubble”.  El Capitan is third in Southern California in Division III, and Christian third in D-IV.

The Highlanders, trailing, 20-17, scored on Curtis Holmes’ two-yard run with less than two minutes remaining  to defeat No. 18 Ventura St. Bonaventure, 24-20, in an Honor Bowl game at Oceanside.

Helix, which was 22nd in Cal-Hi Sports’ preseason rankings, stayed grounded, rushing 50 times for 316 yards.

Oceanside, 21st in the preseason rankings, defeated St. Augustine, 34-28.

Mission Hills, 12th in the preseason, fell nine places after falling to Timpview of Provo, Utah, which outscored the Grizzlies, 14-0, in the fourth quarter of a 42-28 victory.

More Honor Bowl games are scheduled this week at Oceanside. Helix takes on Loomis Del Oro and Oceanside meets Mission Viejo.

Other games find Mission Hills playing host to Torrey Pines, St. Augustine visiting Madison, Mater Dei going to El Capitan, and West Hills at Christian.

Thanks to Hoover  alumnus and  school historian Chuck Hansen, we were able to  acquire footage of Hoover’s celebrated football victory over San Diego in 1956, plus a 1992 televised interview with the late Walt Baranski, a star on that Cardinals team.

Baranski, who was slowed by  a progressive, crippling disease and  passed away at age 69 in 2008, was a three-sport standout at Hoover and played end and placekicked for the team that upset San Diego and went on to win the City Prep League championship.

Baranski was a starting guard on two Hoover basketball teams that were a combined 47-9, a young member of the 1954 American Legion Post 6 championship squad, a starting third baseman on the Hoover club that reached the 1957 Southern California finals, and played baseball and basketball at the University of Oregon.

The game film reflects the technology of the day, but has been preserved by Mr. Hansen and is a memorable moment in school history.

No turnout in the 80-plus seasons of Hoover football  ever approached the estimated 7,000 which overflowed the Cardinals’ stadium on the night they came from a 12-0 deficit to defeat arch-rival San Diego, 20-12.

Baranski, No. 84,  played end and was on offense and defense for Hoover, kicked off, and kicked points after touchdowns in the memorable game.

The video is 9 minutes, 48 seconds.  It does not include the entire game film.  San Diego scored when Bobby Staten ran 20 yards with a recovered fumble and on a blocked punt recovered in the end zone.

Hoover’s touchdowns were scored by Bob Williams, quarterback Gary Bailey, and fullback Denny Berg.

Search “1956: Then and Now for Hoover’s Engle” and “1956: “Smiley Was San Diego High Legend” for a review of the County’s 1956 football season.

Charlie Powell, the oldest and most renowned member of an iconic  San Diego family, passed away  Labor Day morning at age 82.

A resident of  Altadena, Powell was in San Diego for a family function when he became ill on Friday.  He died at Scripps Mercy Hospital.

“He was my big brother and I respected him so much,” said younger brother Jerry. “He was always there for me with an encouraging word, always positive. That’s the kind of man he was.”

The brothers Charlie, Ellsworth, and Art were outstanding athletes at San Diego in the early ‘fifties, and Jerry was a star at Lincoln a decade later.

Charlie was the Southern California player of the year in football in 1950, starred in basketball, held the school track-and-field shot put record for 31 years, and signed as a professional baseball player upon high school graduation in 1951.

His greatest thrill, Powell once said, was when “Duane Maley told me that I would be the only man ever to earn twelve varsity letters at San Diego High.”

Powell did that, lettering all three years in four sports, football, basketball, track, and baseball. Maley was his football coach.

Powell went from one season in the St. Louis Browns’ farm system and signed an NFL contract with the San Francisco 49ers in 1952. He had 10 tackles for loss including quarterback sacks of Bobby Layne against the Detroit Lions in one game his rookie season.

Powell turned to boxing in the mid-fifties and rose to become No. 4 in heavyweight rankings.  He returned to pro football with the Oakland Raiders in 1960.

Helix beat a good Ventura St. Bonaventure team, 24-20, Saturday night, but Mission Hills was beaten by Timpview of Provo, the No. 3 team in Utah, 42-28.

San Diego Section teams thus finished the first weekend far  in arrears against intersectional teams.

In games involving teams from the city and county, the area was 2-8 in California and 5-11 including Utah, Hawaii, and Arizona.

Included was the carnage of dishearteningly blowout losses of 55-10 for Cathedral against Folsom of the Sac-Joaquin Section and 38-0 for La Costa Canyon by Newport Beach Corona del Mar of the Southern.

Cathedral gets another shot this week, taking on strong Westlake Village Oaks Christian, which lost to Bakersfield, the defending state Division I champion, 34-21.

Helix is back at it against Loomis Del Oro, another Sac-Joaquin Section entry with big biceps, while Oceanside takes on Mission Viejo.

Del Oro, 9-3 in 2013, was beaten by Helix, 35-24, in the state D-II championship in ’11. The Golden Eagles lost a home game to Honolulu Kamehameha, 25-17, in their 2014 opener.

Mission Viejo, 11-1 a year ago, was surprised by Bakersfield Liberty, 18-7.

The UT-San Deigo top 10 will be out in a couple days.  My ballot, cast this morning, was:

1—Helix (1-0).
2—Oceanside (1-0).
3—Mission Hills (0-1).
4—St. Augustine (0-1).
5—Eastlake (0-1).
6—Poway (1-0).
7—Ramona (1-0).
8—El Capitan (1-0).
9—Rancho Bernardo (1-0).
10—Rancho Buena Vista (0-1).

 DEADLY VIRUS

Helix’s victory marked the first time the Highlanders have played a Ventura County team since 1957, when they bused North to Oxnard and went home with a 52-6 loss that became part of a footnote in area football history.

The 1957 season was marked by the Asian Flu epidemic which killed 70,000 Americans and about two million world wide.

Most area teams were forced to cancel games.  Twenty-two of Helix’ 45 players were home with the flu, including seven starters, but coaches and school officials decided to go through with the game.

Read about the effects of the flu in San Diego  in “1957:  Different Kind of Enemy“.

I feared for Cathedral and didn’t want to battle I-5 traffic on a Friday night to get to Oceanside, so the veteran blogger took in Rancho Buena Vista at Poway and was impressed.

With the winner and the loser.

Poway, 4-7 in 2013 and stung by the recent loss of two potential sophomore stars, quarterback Tate Martell and receiver Tyjon Lindsay, who moved together to Las Vegas and hooked up with nationally ranked Bishop Gorman, rolled to a 24-0 halftime lead over the Longhorns, then hung on with a late touchdown to win, 30-28.

(Martell and Lindsay meanwhile were 100 miles up the road, leading Gorman to a 48-27 win over Southern Section and Trinity League toughie Anaheim Servite at Cerritos College.

Martel threw for three touchdowns and ran for 130 yards.  Lindsay returned a punt 92 yards for a touchdown and caught touchdown passes of 10 and 29 yards).

INELIGIBILITY BLUES

Rancho coach Paul Gomes, who has led a resurgence at the South Vista campus, was playing with less than a full complement.

“We’ve got fourteen players ineligible for six weeks because of grades, including twelve starters,” said a parent whose son starts for the Longhorns.

But quarterback Malik Taylor, a sturdy, 6-foot, 2-inch, 200-pounder with a live arm, passed for four touchdowns in the second half and had his team in front 28-24 with less than three minutes remaining.

INTERSECTIONAL BLUES

Folsom 55, Cathedral 10.

Newport Beach Corona del Mar 38, La Costa Canyon 0.

Temecula Great Oak 38, Carlsbad 21.

Capistrano Valley Christian 52, Maranatha 0.

OUTSIDE CALIFORNIA

Avondale Westview, Arizona, 48, Westview 13.

Francis Parker 22, Honolulu Arthur Radford 20.

Mesa Desert Ridge, Arizona, 23, Eastlake 11.

Torrey Pines 34, Pleasant Grove, Utah, 21.

TRUE GRID

Best  local matchup saw No. 2 Oceanside defeat No. 5 St. Augustine, 34-28…No. 1 Helix and 4 Mission Hills have intersectional battles tonight, Helix vs. Ventura St. Bonaventure, and Mission Hills vs. Timpview of Provo, Utah…Paul Gomes is in his third season at Rancho Buena Vista, improving from 6-6 in 2011 to 9-4 in 2013…the Broncos were 5-24-1 in their three previous seasons…