August 2009 Archives

Angel Santiago is entering his third year as Etiwanda High School's starting quarterback. He has already accounted for nearly 6,000 yards and 50 touchdowns in his career.

Now he's going to show what he can really do?!?

"We're expecting a breakout season from him," Etiwanda coach Steve Bryce said. "Our expectations are really high not just throwing the ball but running the ball too."

Santiago passed for 2,449 yards and 19 TDs last season. In 313 pass attempts he was intercepted just seven times (a completion percentage of 59 wasn't too shabby either). And that's just throwing the ball...

Upon first glance, the San Dimas High School football team appears to have missed its best opportunity (by a single excruciating point, no less).

The Saints graduated 320 rushing yards per game and the entire offensive line from a team that rolled up 46 points per game... but lost a 40-39 heartbreaker to Covina Northview for last season's Valle Vista League title (before surprisingly dropping out of the playoffs in the quarterfinals).

Head coach Bill Zernickow believes he's reloading this season. The new backfield running his Wing-T is even bigger that last season's talented trio of Nico Barbone, Daniel Joseph and Erek Brown.

Football coach Dave Fleming's first season at Ganesha was a rousing success.

It consisted of two victories.

But when you haven't won a game on the field since the 2003 season-opener, winning not once but twice represents a mammoth leap. The former Diamond Ranch assistant ended a state-record losing streak on the field at 49 games (Ganesha won a couple of forfeits since the '03 season opener).

Had he switched the 6-1, 250-pound Justin Goytia from offensive line to fullback before the season, Fleming believes Ganesha could have improved exponentially.

"If I would have used Justin at fullback last year, we could have won six to eight games," Fleming said. "I'm not kidding, this kid has a chance to be special. It was my first year and that was a big mistake I made, not realizing that he could have helped us so much more."

Don Lugo High School's George Uko, scout.com's third-ranked defensive tackle in the nation - "I'm still trying to move up to No. 1," he said - has pared his list of 14 scholarship offers to five: USC, Cal, Oregon, Oklahoma and Tennessee.

The 6-foot-4, 295-pound senior who runs a 4.93 40 has scheduled trips to Cal (next week), Tennessee (Oct. 10) and Oregon (Nov. 14).

"I'll probably make my decision after I take my trips," Uko said. "It's hard to believe all this is happening to a kid from Don Lugo."

The defending CIF champs are flat-out scary.

A Rancho Cucamonga High School offense that averaged 30 points per game returns perhaps the best QB-WR combination in the country in reigning CIF-SS Central Division offensive MVP Greg Watson and USC-committed tight end/receiver Randall Telfer.

But that's not all. The Cougars' top two running backs return. As do three starting offensive linemen.

And Watson, who accounted for over 3,500 yards and 30 TDs last season, has a new reason to do even better.

Had Terrence Charles been eligible last season, the Montclair High School football team could have made the playoffs - a season after going 0-10. This according to head coach Rick Ward, who took over last year following the winless 2007 campaign.

Well, Charles IS eligible this year. The Division-I talent will take over at running back for a Montclair team that "lost four games in the fourth quarter that would have put us in the playoffs," according to Ward.

The 5-10, 175 pound Charles' ineligibility expired in time for the final two games of last season. According to MaxPreps.com, he rushed for 52 yards on 16 carries in a lopsided loss to Colony. But, in the season finale against Garey he took his lone reception for a 56-yard touchdown and piled up 91 yards on just six carries. "He could have run for 100 touchdowns if I would have left him in," said Ward.

Last year appears to have been the year for Ontario High's football team.

The result of a banner 2008 season: a second-place finish in the Mt. Baldy League and a swift exit from the playoffs courtesy of a 42-21 loss to Menifee Paloma Valley (to Ontario's credit, Paloma Valley lost their next game by just 8 to eventual CIF champ Rancho Cucamomga).

Ontario returns just three players that started a game last season, all of which are linemen. EVERY SINGLE SKILL PLAYER IS GONE. Ontario coach Steve Randall is saying all the right things about trying to prove he's built a program, but he isn't veiling understandably lowered expectations.

"We did a lot to turn the corner last year as a football program," fourth-year coach Randall said. "We might be able to make a run for the playoffs but we also realize there will be a lot of trial and errror. "

However, Randall proclaimed this year's team potentially more talented than 2008 squad.

It was announced Tuesday that a matchup between defending CIF-SS champions will be televised at 7:30 p.m. by PRIME TICKET on Sept. 25 when Rancho Cucamonga visits Covina Charter Oak to settle a score.

A meeting between these two eventual undefeated CIF champions ended in a less than satisfying 14-14 tie in Week 3 of last year. That, it just so happened, turned out to be the lone blemish on each team's schedule the rest of the season.

Who could have imagined what a colossal game the rematch would turn out to be?

"They've got those two guys," Montclair coach Rick Ward said, "But two guys can do a lot of damage."

Those "two guys" on the Don Lugo High School football team are: defensive lineman George Uko (perhaps the most dynamic player to emerge from the Inland Valley in my three years here) and RB/FS Steven Bethley, a potential Pac-10 player.

A 6-foot-4, five-star defensive tackle who runs a 4.9 40 - he was 296 pounds at his last weigh in - Uko is rated the third best in the country at his position by scout.com. (He'll play defensive end for Don Lugo) He has already received 19 scholarship offers.

"He's getting recruited," Don Lugo coach Rick Martin said, "by just about every school in the nation."

Garey High School hasn't exactly been a college football factory of late (it hasn't made the playoffs in nine years, among other shreds of evidence). But the youthful Vikings have, not one, but two Division-I recruits who could come into their own this season.

Junior wide receiver Dominique Williams (6-3, 180) and junior offensive tackle Chris Jimenez (6-4, 285) are drawing interest in Pomona despite a team that has produced seven wins in three years. The scholarship offers haven't begun to arrive yet but "I imagine it will happen real soon," says Garey first-year coach Leonard Hudson.

A Garey team returning six starters on each side of the ball has the talent to challenge for a playoff spot in the Mt. Baldy League. Whether that talent can be harnessed remains to be seen.

The bad news was Williams, Jimenez and a host of juniors were forced into action as sophomores when several seniors quit the team. The good news is Williams, Jiminez and a host of juniors were forced into action as sophomores when several seniors quit the team.

Garey didn't attend any passing tournaments this summer. The Vikings "just concentrated on ourselves," says Hudson. "We've got a lot of young talent, so you've just gotta be patient with it and develop it."

"You've gotta be careful with a situation like this," continued Hudson, who coached for 14 years at Pomona High School before coaching linebackers at Baldwin Park HS last year. "Kids come off a losing season, they're skeptical about buying in. They want to be sure about what's going on with the program. Being in Pomona, I've experienced kids quitting a lot, so I know you've got to be careful."

The theories are numerous:
1. Colony's playoff division doubled in difficulty.
2. The team was young (just 15 of the 53 on the roster were seniors)
3. You can't win championships EVERY year.

Whatever the reason, Colony had a disappointing 2008 by the lofty standards set with consecutive CIF-SS Central Division championships in '06 and '07. The once-invincible Titans finished third in their own league after a streak of 12 consecutive Mt. Baldy League wins was halted last season.

"We don't want to make any excuses but we just weren't ready to play last year," says Colony's Anthony Rice who has two CIF titles in three years as a head coach. "It humbled us to become a 5-6 team."

Chaffey High School has got to be one of the only places where offensive line may be a more glamorous position than quarterback... both spend the majority of their time blocking.

Famous for their gritty style, Chaffey's clock-killing ground game may be better this year than it was when the Tigers claimed the Mt. Baldy League title last season for the first time since 2005 because 12th-year head coach Chris Brown is returning four of his five starting linemen - and they're all juniors.

With high school football season less than three weeks away (Week zero games begin Thursday, Sept. 3) keep your eye out because I'll be previewing some Inland Valley teams in the next couple of weeks.