TWO-MINUTE DRILL

It is fitting, perhaps, that the Corona del Mar High football team has benefited from the quarterback play of senior Mater Dei transfer Taylor Hughes.

After all, the current quarterback for Mater Dei (7-1), ranked No. 4 in the CIF Southern Section Pac-5 Division, is sophomore Matt Barkley, a Corona del Mar resident who is a product of Newport-Mesa Junior All-American Football.

Through eight games for the Monarchs, Barkley is 59 of 99 for 838 yards with seven touchdowns and four interceptions.

Hughes, meahwhile, continues to threaten a few Sea Kings’ records. Though he missed two games with a sore shoulder, he has completed 76 of 130 for 1,246 yards, with 12 TDs and nine interceptions.

Hughes, who has at least one TD pass in each game he has played this season, needs just three more TD tosses to surpass the single-season record set by Mike McClellan in 1996.

With 19 completions against Laguna Hills, Hughes just missed the school single-game record of 21, set by Matt Evans in 1991.

On his 25th carry, Lepper had his longest run, dragging five would-be tacklers with him for about half of the 21-yard run. The play gave the Mustangs, then up, 10-7, a first down at the Cerritos 19 with three minutes to go. Costa Mesa proceeded to run out the clock.

“We wanted to keep the clock moving, as well as gain chunks of yards,” Coach Jeremy Osso said. “That’s what D.J. does.”

The younger Barnes, who played for his father at Los Al, also brought along a handful of Eagles players, who, he said, were amazed by the two Sunset League teams’ level of play.

The half ended without the Lightning being allowed to run another play.

Sage Hill Coach Tom Monarch and the officials had a long discussion about the time after the play ended.

“I know they have a tough job,” Monarch said. “I just told them when it gets down to seven seconds, you have to have one referee watching the clock. They listen to coaches whine all game. It’s tough for them. Sometimes calls will go your way and sometimes a call will go against you.”

The Bretheren Christian players rushed off the field to their locker room while Monarch was talking to the referees.

“I thought they were giving away cars they ran off so fast,” Monarch said. “I was about to go back there and check if there were any free cars.”

Brinkley said the last game at Veterans he was involved in, before last week, was when he was playing quarterback at Cerritos College.

Eleven of the Mustangs’ starters against Cerritos hadn’t started against Katella.

“This is the team we thought we had all along,” Osso said. “We had basically a whole new team out there tonight.”