Campbell’s passing attack, led by quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, and a ball-hawking defense made it a rough return to the OIA Open Division for visiting Farrington on Saturday.
Sagapolutele completed 18 of 30 passes for 408 yards and five touchdowns and the No. 2 Sabers forced six turnovers in a 50-7 victory over the No. 7 Governors.
Campbell (3-0, 1-0) scored 29 points in the first half and 21 in the fourth quarter against Farrington (3-2, 0-1), which was promoted after playing in Division I the last two years.
“We got off to a good start. The second half we got off to a slow start,” Campbell coach Darren Johnson said. “We did some things, our quarterback did some things, our defense played good football.”
The Sabers scored two defensive touchdowns in the second half on Austyn Filoteo’s 44-yard fumble return and Aisiah Paogofie’s 63-yard interception return. Two other Governors’ turnovers led to touchdowns by the Sabers in the first half.
Campbell scored touchdowns on four of its five first-half possessions with Rusten Abang and Tyson Ball each catching two touchdown passes. Campbell went up 7-0 on Sagapolutele’s 36-yard pass to Abang and Jadyn Parker’s PAT kick with 7:26 left in the first quarter.
The Sabers scored on their next possession on a 69-yard strike from Sagapolutele to Ball with 3:18 left in the first quarter.
At that point, Sagapolutele was 3 of 4 for 142 yards.
The Sabers punted on their next possession, but Campbell’s Filoteo intercepted a DJ Faavi pass over the middle and returned the ball 10 yards to the Governors’ 42.
“The interception, it didn’t take me, it took the team to do it.” Filoteo said. “I read my coverages, just dropped back and I was there for the pick.”
Campbell cashed in on a perfectly thrown fade pass from Sagapolutele to Ball down the left side, which made it 21-0 with 5:14 to go before halftime.
On the Governors’ next possession, Chansen Smith was strip-sacked by Paogofie and the Sabers’ Kolea Kanealii recovered the ball at the Farrington 33.
Campbell then went up 29-0 on Sagapolutele’s 1-yard pass to Abang and Jayzen Fernandez’s 2-point conversion run with 35 seconds left in the half.
“The first half, that’s not me at all,” said Sagapolutele, who has six career 400-yard passing games. “That’s just all my receivers and all the hard work they put in and my O-line as well. Shout out to my O-line, they’re laying their bodies on the line just for me.”
Sagapolutele was 12 of 18 for 259 yards in the first half for the Sabers, whose four first-half touchdown drives averaged 3.75 plays and 54.5 yards.
The Governors had 105 yards of total offense before halftime.
Farrington got within 29-7 on the first possession of the second half when Lauititi Liufau intercepted a Sagapolutele pass to the right flat and returned the ball 48 yards for a score. Ku Ponciano made the PAT kick.
“I’d say that’s my biggest mistake. My boy, Lau, picked me off,” Sagapolutele said. “He read the play. He knew it was coming. That’s my mistake for not throwing a good enough ball. We live and learn from our mistakes.”
Campbell went up 36-7 when Filoteo scooped up a botched handoff between Farrington’s Faavi and Kingsten Samuelu, and ran it in with 9:31 left in the fourth quarter.
“I saw it come to me and just picked it up and took it to the house for another six points,” Filoteo said.
The Sabers went up 50-7 on Sagapolutele’s 80-yard pass to Zayden Alviar-Costa with 7:09 remaining and Paogofie’s 63-yard interception return with 3:02 to go.
Campbell’s Alviar-Costa finished with six catches for 131 yards, Ball had three receptions for 123 yards and Abang had five for 93.
Farrington sacked Sagapolutele three times, but was simply picked apart when the Campbell quarterback had time to throw.
“Early on it was hard. We had to get used to the speed, our secondary,” Farrington coach Mike Lafaele said. “He does a great job putting that ball down the field and if guys are open, it’s a touchdown.”
On offense, the Governors’ only threat was Samuelu, who rushed 19 times for 126 yards.
The bruising running back missed Farrington’s previous game against Saint Louis with an injury.
“It’s always good to have him back. Without him, I don’t know what the score would be,” Lafaele said.
The rest of the team only mustered 78 yards of total offense. Farrington’s six turnovers came on 11 possessions.
“We have to figure out who we are on offense,” Lafaele said. “We have a pretty good idea, but we struggled against a really good football team.”
