Jaden Piazza of Northwood drops back to pass during Thursday’s summer league game. (Photos courtesy Harrison Zhang, For OC Sports Zone)
It was a promising start Thursday for Northwood’s football team which went 3-0 in a passing league tournament against Capistrano Valley Christian, Laguna Hills and Laguna Beach at Northwood.
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“Yesterday was a great day to compete against three very good and well coached teams,” said first-year Northwood Coach Paige Nobles. “Each team brought something different in the level of their play and that is why I chose those teams to kick off our 2019 passing league season.
“I was very pleased to see my boys come and compete and even raise their bar of play when they needed too. Going 3-0 against those quality teams gives me high confidence that I hired the best staff to coach these young men.”
Nobles said he was pleased with quarterback Jaden Piazza.
“On the offensive side of the ball Jaden Piazza did extremely well throughout the day,” Nobles said. “Jaden connected on more than half of his total passes and threw six touchdowns on the day.
“Travis Arena was his favorite target connecting with him for four touchdowns. Jackson Baker and newcomer Nate Maloney each caught a touchdown pass.”
On defense, Baker had two interceptions and freshman Andrew Penrod had one.
“As a head coach I was extremely happy with the results that we had and just like I told my players at the end of the day, I couldn’t be happier and was very proud of each of them,” Nobles said. “There will always be room for improvement and we will not be complacent in thinking we do not need to improve.
“I wanted to give a special thanks to each coach for making the trip to Northwood and making it a fun but extremely competitive day.”
Nobles, in an interview before the passing league, said he was pleased with the Timberwolves’ start.
“It’s been going good,” he said. “We’ve got good numbers and we have most of our returners back. We have a few who are on vacation still. I would rather have them take vacation now than in the August program. We have a great freshmen turnout. On eighth grade night, we ended up getting about 63 who were interested and we ended up securing 37 and around 29 have shown up.”
Nobles expects to have between 47 to 53 players on the varsity this season.
Northwood has three more weeks of summer camp wrapping up the session on July 19, Nobles said. Northwood starts fall camp Aug. 5.
He has already set some early goals for the Timberwolves.
“I want positive yardage on every play,” Nobles said. “Another goal is that I want is to cut down on our penalties, especially the ones we had last year…I’m not going to tolerate that. I hold them all accountable and now they’re holding each other accountable so it’s very nice that they have the leadership skills so I don’t have to always be the bad guy.”
RELATED STORY: Photos from Thursday’s games
-Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com
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