He’s only a sophomore.
That makes Mater Dei quarterback JT Daniels’ accomplishments this season even more impressive.
Daniels threw for 407 yards during Mater Dei’s 63-30 win over Vista Murrieta last week. That gives him 4,272 yards for this season. That is the Orange County single-season record for passing yardage, surpassing the previous record of 4,219 yards that Conner Manning of El Toro established in 2011.
Daniels has also set the O.C. single-season record for completions. He has 269 this year.
He has shattered the county single-season record for touchdown passes. Daniels has 63 touchdown passes, far surpassing the previous mark of 52 set by Rancho Alamitos’ Nick Brown in 2014.
Daniels has 7,314 career passing yards. The O.C. record is 9,471, held by Matt Barkley of Mater Dei. Daniels has 443 career completions; the O.C. record is 663, set by Todd Marinovich who played two years at Mater Dei and two at Capistrano Valley, 1984-87.
Daniels is on pace to break both of those career records next season.
And he would still have his senior year remaining.
• The CIF-Southern Section sets playoff games for 7:30 p.m. starts. Kickoffs can be switched to 7 p.m. if that is agreed upon by both participating schools and by the CIF-SS office. Games that were changed to 7 p.m. starting times as of noon Monday: Rancho Cucamonga vs. Mater Dei at Orange Coast College; Valencia of Valencia at San Clemente; Murrieta Valley at La Habra; La Mirada-Los Alamitos at Veterans Stadium; Edison at Rancho Verde of Moreno Valley; Lompoc-Corona del Mar at Estancia High; El Modena at Yorba Linda; and Laguna Beach-Santa Ana at Santa Ana Stadium.
• Santa Ana has priority this week for using Santa Ana Stadium as its home field. So the Saints will play there Friday for their Division 13 semifinal playoffs game against Laguna Beach. Mater Dei will use Orange Coast College for its home field for the Division 1 semifinal against Rancho Cucamonga.
• Some might find it ironic that in the Division 1 playoffs Mission Viejo defeated a private-school team, Servite, in the first round and lost to public-school Rancho Cucamonga in the second round. Mission Viejo coach Bob Johnson had voiced his displeasure that his team was placed in a division that has larger private school teams in it.
• Only the Division 1 championship game will be at Angel Stadium next week, specifically, Dec. 3 at 7:30 p.m. Football finals in the other 12 divisions will be at sites selected by the home teams. Those sites must be approved by the CIF-SS office, which, as usual, will receive objections from a few visiting teams that are going to contend that the selected site is too small, too far away, the parking is insufficient there, the coffee won’t be good enough, etc.
• The football season continues beyond CIF-SS championship games. CIF State regional games, in 12 divisons, are Dec 9 and 10.
• The CIF State championship bowl games are Dec. 16 and 17. Teams selected to play in the Open Division game, one from Southern California and the other a Northern California team, skip the Regionals round.
• Santa Margarita in 2015: 5-5 overall, 1-4 in the Trinity League including league losses to Orange Lutheran and Servite, and no playoffs. Santa Margarita in 2016: 7-5 overall, 2-3 in league including league wins over Orange Lutheran and Servite and a playoff win over state-ranked Serra of Gardena.
• San Clemente is 8-2 in playoff games, 2014-16. The Tritons in 2013 finished 2-8 overall and were 0-4 in the South Coast League.
• A reason that Newport Harbor did not make the playoffs is because the playoffs selection committee decided that West Covina, which beat out Newport Harbor for the final berth in Division 6, came from a superior league. West Covina plays in the Hacienda League, Newport Harbor in the Sunset League. The teams that finished 1-2 in the Hacienda League, Los Altos of Hacienda Heights and Charter Oak of Covina, advanced to the semifinals as did the Sunset League’s top two teams, Edison and Los Alamitos.
• Los Alamitos beat Palos Verdes, 35-7, in the Division 3 second round. Despite the 28-point win, Griffins coach Ray Fenton anticipates more improvement for his team. “We used preseason (nonleague games) to find out who we are, we used the (league) season to clean that up a bit, and we’re using the playoffs to play our best ball, and I think we’e starting to do that. We haven’t played our best game yet.”
Contact the writer: sfryer@scng.com
