QB throws 6 TDs to lead Gorman past ranked California team — PHOTOS
Bishop Gorman’s football team hasn’t lost consecutive games since 2018. Backup quarterback Maika Eugenio made sure it didn’t happen Friday night.
Starting for an injured Melvin Spicer IV, Eugenio threw four first-half touchdown passes and led Gorman to touchdowns on all five of its first-half drives.
Eugenio’s strong first half propelled the Gaels, ranked No. 5 nationally by MaxPreps, to a 55-28 home win over No. 12 Orange Lutheran (California) in their final out-of-state game of the season.
“I thought the offense has just been boiling,” Gorman coach Brent Browner said. “They’ve been boiling and are ready. You’ll hear me say this for the rest of the year, but we have to take the easy and what (the defense) gives you and we didn’t last week (at Mater Dei). We didn’t take anything easy, they gave us plenty of stuff, and we missed it. Today, we took the easy stuff, and it turned into big stuff.”
Eugenio completed 16 of 24 passes for 255 yards and threw six touchdowns for Gorman (3-1) to keep its slim hopes for a second consecutive national championship alive. The Gaels had their 27-game winning streak snapped on Sept. 6 in a 31-15 loss at No. 1 Mater Dei (Calif.).
“It feels good,” Eugenio said. “It just brings team morale up. Our main focus this week was to let (the Mater Dei) game be in the past and go out here and ball. That’s what we did, and we got the victory.”
Spicer played sparingly in the loss to Mater Dei, was not in pads and had his right arm in a sling as the Gaels were warming up against Orange Lutheran. Browner said the decision was precautionary.
On Friday, Eugenio’s fourth touchdown pass of the first half proved to be the backbreaker.
Orange Lutheran (3-1) scored on a trick play when wide receiver Chris Flores Jr. took a reverse handoff and hit Tyler Hennessy on a 28-yard score to cut Gorman’s lead to 28-14 with 4:51 before the break.
Gorman fed running back Myles Norman heavily on its following possession to move the ball and eat some time. On third-and-goal from Orange Lutheran’s 4-yard line, Eugenio hit Hawaii commit Brandon Gaea for a touchdown with 20 seconds left, and the Gaels went into halftime up 35-14.
“It was big to build some momentum, and we wanted to keep our streak. We scored on six drives in a row,” Eugenio said. “It was big in not letting them come back in the game.”
The Gaels went into their bag of tricks on their first drive of the second half. First, Eugenio broke off an 18-yard run on fourth down to keep the drive alive. Then, Greg Toler took a lateral from Eugenio and found a wide-open Anthony Hickman on a 23-yard score.
Eugenio added a 14-yard touchdown pass to Gaea and a 50-yard score to Toler in the fourth quarter. Orange Lutheran quarterback and Nebraska commit TJ Lateef threw two of his four touchdown passes in the fourth quarter for the Lancers.
“(Eugenio) played well, and more than just his talented arm, I thought he played well with his brain,” Browner said. “There were some things they threw at him that he had to decipher really quickly and make quick decisions and get rid of the ball quick. That was one of our mistakes from last week. … We showed we can fix it.”
Toler finished with 102 receiving yards, and all three receptions were touchdowns.
“The week before, we had some things that were supposed to go to Greg,” Browner said. “We made sure that we got the ball in (Toler’s) hands a little bit easier, so we could make sure it was coming to him. We’ve know how electric he is, and I don’t think a lot of people in the country do.”
Gaea added 74 yards on six catches with a pair of touchdown catches. Norman rushed for 97 yards, and Jonathan Coar added 110 on the ground and a short touchdown run.
Orange Lutheran managed 163 total yards of offense in the first half. Most of it came on an 80-yard opening drive that Lateef capped off with an 8-yard touchdown pass to Flores to give the Lancers a brief 7-0 lead.
Eugenio answered right back. He found a wide-open Toler to his left, and he raced down the sideline 46 yards for a touchdown. The junior right-hander hit Toler again on the following possession for a 6-yard score to put the Gaels ahead 14-7 with 4:29 left in the first quarter.
“Our main goal this week was to score on the first drive,” Eugenio said. “That’s what the coaches talked to us about. It definitely got us in a groove, and once we started scoring, they couldn’t stop us.”
Gorman’s defense came up with a turnover when Hayden Stepp recovered a Lateef fumble. Eugenio kept up his hot start with a 6-yard touchdown pass to LSU commit Derek Meadows on the first play of the second quarter. Coar added a 2-yard touchdown run to put the Gaels ahead 28-7 midway through the second quarter.
“I’m just happy we were able to come out against another great team, probably one of the better defenses statistically so far this year, and I was glad the kids responded to last week,” Browner said. “That was a really, really tough one, and we didn’t play well but today they did.”
The Gaels have a bye next week and then open 5A Division I league play at Liberty at 6 p.m. Sept. 27.
“It’ll be another hard week,” Browner said. “All the tough teams we played out of state just get us ready for the great teams we have in state. Liberty is a great team.”
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
