Sports
Football: El Toro 47, Huntington Beach 24
Conner Manning throws 66 passes, six for touchdowns, as the Chargers open season with a victory.
What a difference a year makes. Twelve months ago, El Toro opened its football season with a 23-21 loss to Huntington Beach, then went on to win 12 in a row and play for the Southern Section's Southwest Division championship.
In its 2012 season opener against the same opponent, El Toro scored twice as many points and looked twice as dangerous. The end result was a 47-24 nonleague victory over the Oilers on Thursday at Trabuco Hills High.
Conner Manning, who last season broke Matt Barkley's county single-season passing record, set down the gantlet on his senior year: he passed for 454 yards and six touchdowns.
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It's clear that the Chargers are going to take advantage of Manning's right arm. He completed 44 of 66 passes, with only one intercepted—his last.
All told, Manning completed touchdown passes to Dominic Collins of 33, 14 and 9 yards, Blake Murphy of 45 and 26 yards, and Cody White of 5 yards.
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Alec Shoffeit caught 12 passes for 119 yards—he had 40 last season—but Manning spread it around. He completed passes to six receivers, including eight for 103 yards to Collins and nine for 68 yards to White, who caught a county-best 85 passes in 2011.
Last season, in which Manning averaged 37.6 passes per game, he had a single-game high of 54 passes attempted—against Huntington Beach, in which he completed 31 with two touchdowns and two interceptions.
He had single-game highs of 33 completions and five touchdowns against Esperanza in the first round of the playoffs.
Those personal bests are now toast.
Manning, who has committed to Utah, broke Barkley's 2007 record for yards passing. The quarterback at USC and one of the Heisman Trophy favorites, Barkley passed for 3,560 yards in his junior season; Manning finished with 4,219 and 41 touchdowns with only eight interceptions.
Manning's totals last season included four playoff games, but the playoffs this season aren't a given for the Chargers even if they're better; they are now in the South Coast League instead of the Sea View League, they are playing Division I instead of Division VI, and there are only two automatic playoff berths from the league instead of three.
But for a night, on the first Thursday of the season, El Toro looked like the best team around.
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