Prep Friday : SOUTHERN SECTION CENTRAL CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP PREVIEW : No Brag, Just Fact : MR. MARRUJO : Valencia Coach Eschews a Rah-Rah Style for a System That Has Captured 4 Titles

Oh, oh. Mr. Marrujo is wearing his “I’m-taking-care-of-business-so-keep-your-questions-to-a-minimum” face.

Tight lipped, eyes grounded, Mr. Marrujo always gets this way about 2 p.m., as he makes his way toward the Valencia High School football practice field.

Mr. Marrujo has been the coach at Valencia since 1981, and in that time he has turned a very poor program into one of Orange County’s best.

In fact, Valencia plays Bolsa Grande at 7:30 tonight for the Central Conference championship in Orange Coast College’s LeBard Stadium. This is the same Valencia football program that had not won a league championship in the school’s first 50 years. With Marrujo, Valencia has won four consecutive Orange League titles.

Whatta guy. Just don’t tell that to Mr. Marrujo or he’ll shoot you his “C’mon-I-think-you’re-making-much-too-much-out-of-this” face.

Mr. Marrujo doesn’t like to hear what a great guy he is. He doesn’t like to hear what great players he has. He doesn’t like to talk about football that much.

But then who likes to talk about their job? Which is what coaching football is to Mike Marrujo. A job. A job he does very well, a job he likes very much, but a job all the same.

He rolls his eyes at the coaches who approach the job as some sort of religious vocation.

What we’re doing here is much bigger than football. We’re molding the minds and hearts . . . Marrujo gives another roll for the Win-or-Die set. Even though he can talk about every game he’s lost and why, a loss doesn’t destroy him. And a victory is totally fulfilling.

“If we win the game you won’t see me with tears in my eyes after,” he said. “If we lose, I’m not going to go out and shoot myself.”

Mr. Marrujo will never be mistaken for Mr. Sentimentality.

When Valencia came back to beat Sunny Hills in two overtimes in last week’s semifinals, Ron Cozort, school principal, described a chaotic scene.

“It was a madhouse, people were laughing, people were crying.”

And Marrujo?

“Same old Mike. It was, ‘OK, lets get the celebrating over, get back on the bus and go home.’ ”

Marrujo said he was very excited after the game. He just doesn’t think it’s his place to show it.

“Mike’s a very private person,” Cozort said. “His idea of a post-game celebration is getting together with his wife and a few friends in a corner.”

If you’re a reporter, there’s never a good time to call Mike Marrujo. His answers are short and to the point. He’s professionally polite, but he does sound like a man who was caught mid-carve through the Christmas goose.

And it’s not just reporters.

“I find that whenever I talk about football with Mike, it’s like talking business with a businessman,” Cozort said. “He’s serious, and to the point. Now, if you change the subject to something else, he’s a very different, very personable person. But he takes his job seriously.”

Marrujo has developed a system at Valencia with very definite ideas about people’s roles in that system.

Fans cheer. Assistant coaches make friends with players. Players do as they are told and expect nothing but the success of the team in return.

Valencia, like many other schools, awards helmet decals to players for exceptional play. However, decals are only given out after victories.

“What’s the use of rewarding a player after the team loses?” Marrujo said. “It doesn’t make much sense. We want to eliminate, as much as we can, any individual goals or recognition during the season. Everything is done for the team.”

The punch line to Marrujo’s I-Am-Zero system is that it produced Orange County’s most chronicled player, Ray Pallares.

Pallares, the state’s all-time leading rusher. Pallares, the media event.

For three seasons--Pallares graduated last school year--Marrujo watched Pallares have big game after big game. There were feature stories and statistical charts. Photographs and commemorative Ray Pallares towels.

The young man was a staaaaar.

That is, to everyone but Ray Pallares and Mike Marrujo, who busied themselves by answering reporters’ questions with “If the team wins,” and “It’s not important what one player does.”

Pallares was the prototype Valencia player--a sturdy but unspectacular athlete who was aware that Marrujo’s system works and that he must conform to it.

Valencia practices are not loud or wild. Players know what is expected of them. They go from one drill to another with all the hoopla of someone returning from a coffee break.

“I think the players in our system become a lot like me,” Marrujo said.

No kidding.

“We take care of what we have to do,” he said. “There isn’t a lot of room for other things.”

Well, there might be some room for a conference championship trophy. And who knows? If he wins, Mr. Marrujo might even flash a ‘Gee-I’m-really-happy-and-I-don’t-care-who-knows-it’ smile.

Well . . . maybe.

Nah. Valencia Starting Lineup

OFFENSE

No. Pos. Name Ht. Wt. 81 WR Robert Naverrette 6-0 150 81 FL David DeFilippo 6-2 180 90 TE Mark Walejko 6-4 205 74 OT Shawn Racobs 6-0 215 73 OT Don Winters 6-4 200 61 OG Brad Hall 6-0 195 52 OG Alan Harrison 6-0 190 54 C Fred Jenkins 5-11 195 9 QB Chris DeRisio 5-9 180 43 FB Keef Leasure 5-10 186 22 TB Dorian Estes 5-9 170

DEFENSE

No. Pos. Name Ht. Wt. 44 DE Marty Dunn 5-11 165 71 DT Joe Acosta 6-0 215 79 DT Eric Petersen 6-2 210 41 DE Jason Cruz 5-9 173 59 LB Kevin Barton 6-1 205 51 LB Steve Rangel 6-0 185 43 LB Keef Leasure 6-3 215 22 CB Dorian Estes 5-9 170 42 CB Randy Roskelly 5-9 150 14 S Mike Edwards 6-1 189 8 S Nacho Garcia 5-9 170

VALENCIA TIGERS

Orange League

(11-1-1)

Westminster Tied, 14-14 Sonora Won, 56-0 El Dorado Won, 41-10 Troy Lost, 8-7 Bolsa Grande Won, 33-10 Magnolia Won, 31-0 Western Won, 28-0 Brea-Olinda Won, 16-3 Anaheim Won, 17-0 Savanna Won, 39-8 Los Amigos Won, 29-12 Artesia Won, 17-14 Sunny Hills Won, 17-14

TIGER LEADERS

SCORING Dorian Estes 72 points Richard Nelson 42 points

RUSHING Dorian Estes 1,471 yards (7.1 average) Keef Leasure 740 yards (6.1 average)

PASSING Co At Yd TD Int Chris DeRisio 60 128 856 15 16

RECEIVING Mike Edwards 28 catches, 415 yards