LONG BEACH — For the second week in a row, the Cathedral Catholic High School football team fell behind early in a championship game.
And for the second consecutive week, the Dons had an answer. Cathedral Catholic scored 28 straight points en route to a 42-21 win over Los Alamitos in Friday’s Division 1-AA Southern California regional championship at Veterans Stadium.
The Dons are scheduled to play Northern California champion Folsom next weekend at Saddleback College for the state championship, but that may change. Saddleback is in the California Community College football playoffs and would host a championship game Saturday with another victory; in that case, the CIF state office would secure an alternate site.
Friday’s win came a week after Cathedral Catholic trailed Carlsbad 16-0 before rallying to a 20-16 victory for the CIF San Diego Section Open Division title.
“Getting behind early certainly isn’t something we like, but Los Al has a super-fast, up-tempo offense. We haven’t seen anything like that, and it took a little time to figure it out,” Dons coach Sean Doyle said. “We were flipping our cornerbacks and doing some different things. Finally, we decided to play defense … and it worked.”
Los Alamitos Kamden Tillis (8) holds onto the ball on the 10-yard line as Cathedral Catholic’s Jordyn Fitzpatrick (3) and Cade Smith (1) moves in to stop him during the first half of the CIF Southern California Division 1-AA Regional final, December 5, 2025, at Veterans Stadium in Long Beach.
(Photo by Steven Georges, Contributing Photographer)
Cathedral Catholic answered with an eight-play, 52-yard drive after recovering an onside kick.Honor Fa’alave-Johnson went the final 13 yards for the score on a fourth-down-and-3 play.
Los Alamitos put together another 10-play drive, this time going 72 yards.
The Dons drew even wirth 2:06 to play in the half, with Fa’alave-Johnson going the final yard to cap a 47-yard drive.
Los Alamitos drove to the Dons’ 9 with 11 seconds to play in the half, but two passes into the end zone were incomplete and a 26-yard field attempt sailed wide.
Cathedral Catholic (11-2) struck quickly to open the second half, with quarterback Brady Palmer hitting Isaac Cook with a 56-yard scoring pass.
After forcing a punt, the Minnesota-bound Palmer found a wide-open Cook for a 79-yard TD.
“Isaac Cook is the best receiver in the county,” Palmer said. “We had a couple of scramble plays, but we have such a good chemistry that I know where he’ll be if the play breaks down.”
Los Al drove again, but Asofa Lauifi stuffed the Griffins’ ballcarrier yard loss on fourth down.
Palmer then drove his team 99 yards on 15 plays, using up nearly nine minutes. This time, Palmer flipped a short pass to Fa’alave-Johnson who turned it into a 20-yard TD.
“Absolutely the turning point in the game,” Doyle said. “It was huge. All we really wanted to do after making the stop was eat up some time. We did that, and scored, too.”
Palmer completed 16 of 21 passes for 306 yards and four TDs, finding Cook on a 9-yarder late in the game.
Cook had seven catches for 213 yards.
“Los Al is a really good team, but we thought we might be able to hit ’em with a big play or two,” Cook said. “A couple of times, Brady had to scramble out of trouble, but I just worked my way to get open. And he found me.”
Fa’alave-Johnson had 28 carries for 135 yards and a pair of TDs. He also caught five passes for 68 yards and a score.
“Los Al was bringing its safeties up to stop the run, so it was tough going for Honor,” Doyle said. “But his banging away opened up the passing game.”
Friday afternoon’s Interstate 5 closure turned Cathedral’s commute north into a three-hour ordeal. The team had food in a separate truck that was an hour behind the team.
Cathedral Catholic 42, Los Alamitos 21
Cathedral Catholic 7 7 14 14 – 42
Los Alamitos 14 0 0 7 – 21
LA – Ibarra 28 pass from Creason (Hofland kick)
CC – Fa’alave-Johnson 13 run (Bernstein kick)
LA – Creason 2 run (Hofland kick)
CC – Fa’alave-Johnson 1 run (Bernstein kick)
CC – Cook 56 pass from Palmer (Bernstein kick)
CC – Cook 79 pass from Palmer (Bernstein kick)
CC – Fa’alave-Johnson 20 pass from Palmer (Bernstein kick)
LA – Tillis 47 run (Hofland kick)
CC – Cook 9 pass from Palmer (Bernstein kick)