Tim Pike, who stepped up last year to be Fontana’s football coach in a time of need, has stepped down.
Pike, 61, is retiring from teaching after more than 20 years in the district and nearly four decades overall teaching. Pike resigned, with the hopes that a younger coach could get a teaching job at Fontana and take over the program. In the meantime, Pike will continue to run the offseason conditioning and weightlifting programs.
A year ago, Fontana had a tough time finding a candidate who would be an on-campus teacher so Pike stepped up. Fontana went 1-9, with the lone win via forfeit over Granite Hills. Pike, who became the interim coach one game into the 2005 season after Joe Kramer left, had also served as an assistant at Big Bear, Miller and Citrus Valley.

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As far as enthusiasm goes, this year’s Fontana High School football team is one of the best that Tim Pike has been around. Pike, a longtime assistant who was hired in the spring to replace Lance Ozier, is enjoying coming to work every day and working with his enthusiastic players.

“I have a great bunch of kids,” Pike said. “It’s just fun sitting back and watching them get after each other and compete. They are great around campus, great in the classroom and really want to learn on the football field.”

While the eagerness to learn is a positive for Fohi, the amount of material they have to absorb is one of the more daunting tasks the Steelers – who went winless last year – face in their final year of the Citrus Belt. Of the 75 kids combined between the JV and varsity teams, Pike estimates that nearly half have not played football.

“It’s great that they are coming out and want to play, but a lot of these kids haven’t played before this year,” Pike said. “We are having to go over a lot of basic fundamental things to get these kids familiar with what’s going on. But as a staff, we enjoy teaching.”
Continue reading “Teaching a premium at Fontana” »

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Fontana High School recently hired it’s next football coach, as former assistant and interim coach Tim Pike was hired May 5. But that’s hardly the only coaching position that needed to be filled at Fohi, as several positions are still unoccupied according to an e-mail sent by Fohi athletic director Amanda Bentley.

Along with seeking assistants to fill the football staff, Fohi is looking to hire a new girls volleyball and girls soccer coach for the upcoming seasons to replace Leah Gomez and Beatriz Alarcon-Jordan, respectively. The Steelers are also looking for assistant coaches for boys soccer, boys basketball and girls basketball. Interested parties can contact Bentley at Fontana High School or via e-mail at bentam@fusd.net.

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The Citrus Belt Area will vote for and announce its releaguing for the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons May 2 after an 8:30 a.m. meeting at Riverside Norte Vista High School. As expected, rumors are flying about possible shifts, with several prominent county schools possibly being impacted.

Possibilities that are being put out there through discussions with sources include Cajon moving from the San Andreas to the Citrus Belt League to replace Fontana, which would join fellow Fontana Unified School District schools Summit and Kaiser in the Sunkist League. The Sunkist would be a FUSD-Colton Joint Unified School District league, with Colton and the new Grand Terrace school joining Bloomington.

The Riverside County schools in the Sunkist — Jurupa Valley, Patriot and Norte Vista — would likely be placed in Riverside County-contained leagues. There might be a jumbling of schools in Riverside County, as schools such as Riverside North and Riverside Poly are supposedly asking for relief from the ultra-competitive Big VIII League. That relief, if granted, could cause a shuffling of schools or even the formation of another league.

Obviously these situations are rumor at this point and will be revealed and voted on in a couple weeks, but I thought it’d be fun to see what people think about such proposed changes.

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