FOOTBALL’88 : CIF Southern Section Elevens to Add More Games With City

If you follow L.A. City Section football, get used to teams playing 10 games and starting their seasons the same night as CIF-Southern Section teams.

Also, you might want to familiarize yourself with Southern Section teams because there figure to be many City-Southern Section match-ups the next few years.

Few contests between City and Southern Section teams are scheduled this year because the schedule changes were approved long after the schedules of City and Southern Section teams had been arranged. But more intersectional games could be scheduled next season now that the City and Southern Section have similar timetables.

Both sections open play tonight.

“The new schedule was designed somewhat to emulate that of the Southern Section,” explained City Commissioner Hal Harkness. “It provides schools the opportunity to schedule attractive opponents.”

In the past, City teams played nine regular-season games and began their season at least one week later than Southern Section teams. The staggered schedule often left City coaches complaining about playing Southern Section opponents who had played at least one game before the City coaches had opened their seasons.

Last season the South Bay’s five City teams played seven intersectional games. Six are scheduled this year.

Carson High Coach Gene Vollnogle doesn’t agree, though, that the new parallel schedules will make it easier to schedule intersectional opponents.

The strength of its program traditionally makes it difficult for Carson, a City school, to schedule non-conference opponents, and because non-league games can affect only the playoff chances of Southern Section teams, these teams still may not want to play Carson despite their parallel schedules. “So we still have scheduling problems,” Vollnogle said. After tonight, Carson visits Bishop Amat and Lynwood, Southern Section schools, before opening conference play.

The 10th game was made optional this season for City teams because some were expected to have trouble scheduling an added game after the change was approved in May as part of a releaguing plan.

City teams formerly played nine games and a scrimmage at which no admission could be charged. The additional game could provide more money for City schools.

The releaguing plan divides City schools in all sports into six conferences, five of which consist of two four-team leagues. The sixth conference includes a five-team league. The conferences and leagues have yet to be named, but conferences are structured roughly along geographical lines and are divided into 4-A and 3-A divisions. The 2-A has been eliminated.

Each team will play seven conference opponents, four in its own league, along with its three non-conference games.

The releaguing plan aligns South Bay City schools in the same conference. Narbonne, Gardena and San Pedro join Washington in the conference’s league of 3-A Division teams while Carson, Banning, Dorsey and Crenshaw make up the 4-A league.

After several years of aligning schools by strength of program, the City returned this year to conferences with natural rivalries--and undoubtedly some mismatches like Banning and Carson in one conference with Narbonne of Harbor City.

Coaches at Carson, Banning, San Pedro and Gardena say they like the new alignment. But second-year Narbonne Coach Lynn Hughes is not satisfied because his school managed only a 2-16 record the last two years and now must play perennial Southland powers Banning and Carson, which likely will overpower the Gauchos. Carson was ranked second in USA Today’s preseason Top 25.

“We have to play the junior colleges of high school football (Banning and Carson), and that’s not fair,” Hughes said. “If we can survive we’ll have a decent game, but how many players will I lose to physical problems before we even start our league season?

“The City had nowhere else to put us without forcing us to travel way out of our area, so they just threw us to the wolves.”

Despite being forced to play Carson and Banning, however, San Pedro Coach Henry Pacheco believes the local contests will benefit his school by creating more interest and providing more revenue with bigger gate receipts.

Pacheco disagrees that the new parallel City and Southern Section schedules eliminate any previous advantage the Southern Section gained from starting its season earlier than the City. The reason: Southern Section teams still can practice with helmets and footballs one week before City teams.

“That does make a difference,” Pacheco said. “Without helmets it is hard to teach offensive linemen to block correctly because they might shy away (from) or slide off the blocks. With the helmets they will not be afraid and (will be) willing to do it the way it is supposed to be done.”

Nonetheless, Pacheco said he would like to play all non-conference games against Southern Section schools because the games are almost always competitive. San Pedro’s only Southern Section opponent this year is Leuzinger.

Another Southern Section advantage the new schedule does not alleviate, said Banning Coach Joe Dominguez, is that Southern Section teams can practice in pads three days before City teams. With most schools working out twice a day, that means Southern Section schools completed six more workouts than City schools before tonight’s games.

“That is like an extra week of practice or an extra week to learn the system,” Dominguez said. “That’s a big difference.”

Tonight, however, Banning opens at San Fernando, a City school, so any such advantage is non-existent.

Banning actually might have an advantage next week when it visits Long Beach Poly of the Southern Section since Poly does not play this week. But Poly Co-Coach Thomas Whitfield doesn’t think so. Poly is ranked third in a CIF-Division I sportswriters poll, and though “Banning will have a game under its belt and we won’t, we’ll have had more practice time so it balances out,” Whitfield said.

Gardena, which opens tonight at Jefferson, doesn’t have to go far for its only intersectional contest next week. Serra of Gardena is the Mohicans’ opponent in their second of three non-conference games.

Getting started earlier agrees with Gardena Coach Dale Hirayama because the Mohicans face Banning in their first conference game, and “you really need three practice games to get ready for Banning,” Hirayama said.

In a related matter, the responsibilities of athletic directors at City schools that opted to play a 10th game will have to be filled by other school administrators until classes start Wednesday because the City does not have enough money to pay athletic directors before then. Almost 40% of the City’s 49 schools scheduled a 10th game, Harkness said.