Everything seemed to be clicking for the Santa Barbara High football team on the road Friday, as the Golden Tornado roared past Baldwin Park, 42-15, in a CIF-SS Division 6 quarterfinal game.
Quarterback Griffin Arnold threw five touchdown passes and running back Everett Rabb-Preston rushed for 148 yards and a touchdown on 19 carries to lead a high-octane attack.
The defense held Baldwin Park without a touchdown until 1:54 left in the third quarter. Last week, Baldwin Park scored 35 points to beat Ventura in the first round and came into the quarterfinal game averaging over 40 points a game.
Santa Barbara (9-3) will return to Peabody Stadium for a semifinal game against Beaumont next Friday. Beaumont defeated Summit, 42-22.
Baldwin Park (10-2) opened the scoring with a field goal at the 7:23 mark of the first quarter.
Santa Barbara answered with a Rabb-Preston touchdown run at 10:40 of the second quarter and never looked back.
Arnold hooked up with Mault for the first of their three touchdown strikes. This one was for 46 yards for a 14-3 lead at 5:10 of the second quarter. The other two were tosses of 9 and 11 yards in the third quarter.
Nate Meister executed a 26-yard reverse to make it 21-3 with 2:18 left until halftime.
After Arnold and Mault completed their TD hat trick, Baldwin Park found the end zone on pass from quarterback Lequand Jackson to Jordan Minor at 1:54 of the third quarter.
The Braves recovered an onside kick and converted it into a 1-yard scoring run by Jackson to make it 35-15 with 20 seconds left in the third quarter.
Arnold put the game away with a 20-yard pass to Keegan Roessler in the fourth quarter.
