It took a few possessions, but Trinity Classical Academy’s offense broke through in the second quarter Thursday night against Southlands Christian and never looked back in a 36-0 victory at College of the Canyons.
The Knights’ defense took care of the rest, holding the Eagles to just 109 yards of total offense in the shutout. Southlands Christian punted four times (one of which was blocked), turned it over on downs three times and tossed an interception to Phineas Yi to close out the first half.
Trinity picked up its second straight win after dropping its first two games of the year.
“That first win got us going,” said wide receiver Tyler Lee, who hauled in a touchdown pass in the second quarter. “It started to give us that positive thinking.”
Southlands Christian never reached as far as Trinity’s 30-yard line in the stout defensive effort. Ryan DeMarois picked up two tackles for a loss and scored three times while Kyle Fields added a sack on a fourth down.
“We’ve just been trying to rally to the ball more on defense,” DeMarois said. “We’ve had some rough games on that side of the ball the first two weeks – weren’t tackling real well, giving up a lot of yards. We fixed a lot of those things tonight.”
The Knights’ runaway second quarter opened with a 42-yard bomb from Yi which landed in the arms of a wide-open Lee. After a blocked punt set the Knights up on the Eagles’ 8-yard line, DeMarois punched it from two yards out on a third-down pitch to the left.
DeMarois notched his second touchdown catch of the night with a little over four minutes to play in the second half, coming back to a pass from Yi in the left corner from nine yards out. Yi completed five of his seven passes for 81 yards to go with the two touchdowns.
It took the offense a drive to get back into gear in the second half but Jacob Estanol made the most of his four carries, scampering down the left sideline for a 75-yard rushing score with two minutes to go in the third quarter.
Backup quarterback Rick Roberts closed out the scoring with an 11-yard pass to Demarois in the fourth quarter.
The Knights and Santa Clarita Christian School will meet next Friday for the Faith Bowl at the College of the Canyons.
