The Palisades High varsity and JV football teams will be back in action Friday night after a much-needed bye week.
The Dolphins (2-1) travel to Huntington Park for a nonleague game with a Spartans team reeling from a 71-0 loss to Salesian. Palisades, on the other hand, is trying to maintain the momentum generated by back-to-back wins against Sylmar and Granada Hills.
Pali High Coach Tim Hyde looks forward to the challenge.
“I coached there in 2000 and 2001, so I’m excited to be going back,” he said. “They’re very aggressive and not afraid to go for it on fourth down no matter where they are on the field. I like what I see of their quarterback on film. No. 1 [Victor Molina] is their best player on offense and they move him around to create mismatches.”
Hyde sees a lot of similarities between the two teams.
“Like us, they lost to a very good private school, we’ve each won our trophy game (theirs is Legacy) and we each won on the road versus City playoff teams. A big takeaway for me is how they came back from three TDs down to beat Chatsworth, a team we couldn’t beat last year.”
In addition to their victories over Chatsworth (43-33) and Legacy (53-35), the Spartans (3-1) beat Lincoln 8-0 in their opener. They reached the Division II quarterfials last fall.
The JV game kicks off at 4 p.m. Friday, followed by the varsity at 7 at Huntington Park High.
— Steve Galluzzo
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