Palo Alto High disbanded its freshman football team early last week due to a lack of players throughout the program. Now the Vikings stare ahead at an uncertain future, with their varsity sitting at just 1-3 entering the league season.
Viking athletic director Jason Fung and first-year varsity coach Jake Halas hope they can re-build interest in the proud program -- state playoff bowl champs as recently as 2010.
"It's just about the numbers right now. No other reason," said Halas by email regarding the folding of the frosh team and the varsity's on-field struggles. "It's difficult to conduct practices with squads of around 20 players each.
"The varsity has very few seniors. (The majority) of the team is underclassmen. Numbers will be back up next year as we will have a typical team as far as the number of senior players are concerned."
Palo Alto has been strong in football over the years, reaching the zenith of California prep football in 2010 by stunning the nation's fifth-ranked team Corona Centennial 15-13 in the state playoff bowl title game in the rain and muck of Carson's Home Depot Center. But participation has dipped across the board lately, with the varsity team at about 35-36 players, including some who are injured.
"At public schools you get what you get," Fung said. "The numbers vary every year. When we were great like in past years we could fill three teams, but it's just one of those things. We have a whole new coaching staff now."
Longtime coach Earl Hansen retired after last season and was replaced by former assistant Halas. Hansen was also the athletic director and has been replaced in that capacity by Fung.
"You have to build your staff," Fung said. "Earl built his staff and made a name for himself and established a program and was a winning coach. Coach Halas will have to build interest so that the numbers can steadily climb."
Fung said that with just two teams now, there are 50-70 players in the program. But with three teams entering the season, 20 or so players at the underclassmen levels was not enough when playing against some of the more powerful schools in the area. Holdover frosh players, Fung said, have been elevated to frosh-soph.
"It's hard to practice with just 22 players, especially when the other teams gets off the bus and they have 90," Fung said. "Your kids are going both ways and playing every down and the other team has fresh legs in the fourth quarter."
The varsity has lost three consecutive games after winning its opener at Sequoia 30-28 in dramatic fashion, on a late field goal. Since then the Vikings against stiff competition have been outscored by a combined 123 to 23.
Said Mark Krail, second-year coach of SCVAL-De Anza power Los Gatos: "I know that when I was at Pioneer and Santa Clara, we'd have ups and downs with certain classes (participation-wise) and then with the freshman class you're sometimes sort of in limbo," Krail said. "Any time you take over for a coach who has been there for a long time and has had success you hope things go a certain way. I can kind of relate because last season we started 0-2 and were searching for our own identity and trying to get on the right track."
Krail also took over for an iconic coach at Los Gatos in Butch Cattolico.
Los Gatos rebounded to win the CCS Division II title last season and is currently 2-1 heading into SCVAL-DeAnza play, but Paly this season does not have Los Gatos-like talent.
Things don't get much easier this week for the Vikings after last week's 35-7 loss to Palma (4-0) which already this season has knocked off St. Francis-Mountain View. The Vikings host contending Wilcox on Friday night to start the SCVAL-De Anza season.
Halas has a lot of hard work ahead of him to get the numbers' game back in Paly's favor and return the swag to Paly football (don't forget, the 2013 team under Hansen only went 6-6). We think the young coach can do it, but it will take some time and patience on everyone's part.
ENCINAL FALLOUT: Monday we reported the problems at Encinal High which included a football brawl last Friday night with visiting Center High of Antelope -- and the decision made jointly by the school, the Alameda Union School District and the football program to forfeit this week's Island Bowl Game to rival Alameda.
The melee resulted from a tackle on a punt near the end of the third quarter and the Encinal player's reaction to it -- a punch to a Center player according to an observer we spoke to who requested anonymity. We also spoke to the assigner of officials, Dennis DiFabio, from the East Bay Officials Assocation and he confirmed the rough stuff that resulted in mass ejections on both sides to the point where Encinal would have difficulty even fielding a team to play a game against Alameda.
DiFabio said he spoke to an observer who said it was the "ugliest thing in a long time" he had seen on a high school football field.
District senior manager of community affairs Susan Davis told us Monday the Island Bowl is being canceled because of both the Jets' unsportsmanlike actions and its lack of available players. Tuesday the district posted on its website a news release further explaining the situation and detailing the fallout.
"We recognize the Island Bowl is part of the fabric of Alameda. We understand the sense of loss many will feel as a result of our decision to forfeit the game," Encinal athletic director Micki Singer said via the release. "But, as a community, we need to support each other by holding one another accountable and by taking steps, however difficult, to teach young people to make better choices and to take responsibility for their actions."
There will still be a junior varsity game between Alameda and Encinal at 6 p.m. at Thompson Field.
The release also said Jet varsity players will perform community service with a local organization devoted to violence prevention and that some Encinal players will also receive discipline from the school.
My reaction? This by all accounts was a terrible situation, but it's far from unprecedented.
In 1972 Serra and San Jose had a major post-game brawl at PAL Stadium, with one player from each school taken away in an ambulance. And during my decades of reporting -- including 20 years in Southern California -- such incidents were not uncommon, including a notable fracas involving Fontana High and Loyola-Los Angeles in 1999. After that melee the Fontana Unified School District had to pay a combined $32,500 for injuries to six Loyola plaintiffs, 13 Fontana players were suspended, two were expelled and one faced misdemeanor battery charges.
But just because such violence occasionally happens, doesn't make it right. Encinal and the district are doing the right thing by canceling the Island Bowl.
FIVE AREA PLAYERS AT PROLIFIC PREP: A quintet of promising NorCal prep basketball players have opted to enroll and play at the new Prolific Prep in Napa. "Pro Prep," as it likes to call itself, is a basketball academy founded by Jeremy Russotti and Philippe Doherty. Its cache of players includes Josh Jackson, the No. 1 rising junior player, plucked out of Detroit.
Doherty will coach the team, which is not sanctioned by the CIF.
Said Doherty in an article a few months ago in MaxPreps: "Most people don't understand or know what we're all about. There are different models (of academies) throughout the country. Many people assume they're all affiliated with professional agents and college boosters. We're not that. We just want to train those who are extremely serious about getting better and who have a central focus in aspiring to maximize their talents."
There is always a mixed reaction to such institutions and Prolific Prep will not necessarily be popular among folks at more traditional high schools, especially ones who might lose top players to the hoops factory with the college prep classes.
NorCal players at Pro Prep and the schools they formerly attended -- according to the roster on the school's website -- are 6-3 senior guard Matt O'Reilly (Campolindo), 6-9 power forward Ryan Stewart (St. Vincent-St. Patrick), 6-10 senior center Sasha French (Justin-Seina), 6-4 junior forward Micah Elan (Lick Wilmerding) and 5-9 sophomore point guard Nick Lombardi (College Prep).
Briefly: Berkeley senior PG Jaimoni Colemen has committed to Weber State women's basketball, reports Chris Roemer ... Los Gatos basketball star Ashleen Quirke has committed to Northern Colorado, tweets @topflightelite ... Graduated Mitty football standout Chandler Ramirez and Mitty's own figure skating star Polina Edmunds have been named the San Jose Hall of Fame prep athletes of the year for 2013-2014.
John Murphy is the Web Content Manager of Prep2Prep.com. He may be reached at jmurphy@prep2prep.com
