THE HIGH SCHOOLS : 4 Area City 3-A Coaches Endure Bitter Taste of Defeat

Thanksgiving Day probably was not an exceptionally joyous affair if your name happened to be Foster, Schaeffer, Mochizuki or Engilman.

Those were four men who probably dourly pushed the cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes around with a fork. Thanksgiving football on TV? It’s a safe bet these guys were turning off the set, ruing the day the game was invented.

The four are coaches whose teams lost in the first round of the City Section 3-A playoffs Wednesday night. Their teams--Grant, Reseda, Van Nuys and Sylmar--had the stuffing knocked out of them and were sent home early to ponder losses of games and appetites.

To wit: Reseda, Joel Schaeffer’s team, was involved in the closest game, a 20-19 loss to South Gate. Van Nuys, Kenji Mochizuki’s team, was pummeled by Locke, 37-6. Jeff Engilman’s Sylmar team was tripped by San Pedro, 31-17, and Gardena stunned Bill Foster’s Grant team, 28-14.

Why the collective first-round fall? If you listen to Schaeffer, the balance of his game rested in a bizarre call by an official.

Reseda was ahead, 19-6, in the third quarter and rolling. According to Schaeffer, a large South Gate crowd that numbered in the thousands had been silenced by a strong first-half performance by the Regents. After a fourth-down play at Reseda’s 25-yard line, the officials brought out the chains for a measurement.

“They brought the sticks out and it showed a gap of three inches from the stick to the ball. It wasn’t even close,” Schaeffer said. “But the ref signaled first down. I went crazy. But there was nothing I could do, because by then the chains were off and the game was on. I know it sounds biased, but he knew he blew it. . . . Their coach said it wasn’t a first down and their guys in the box called down and said they didn’t make it. It gave them all the momentum.”

Whew. That’s a mouthful. But come playoff time emotions are magnified and little things can mean a lot. South Gate went on to score on that drive to cut the lead to 19-13. A deflated Reseda then surrendered a final touchdown for the loss.

Things weren’t so close for Van Nuys, which was making its first playoff appearance in six years. From a defense that had become the team’s backbone, the Wolves lost four starters because of academic ineligibility. And a team with no spine doesn’t stand a good chance of winning.

“I think the kids were nervous,” Mochizuki said. “And some of them looked intimidated.”

But the loss won’t sour a historic year at the school. Mochizuki won’t let it. “We have some really pleasant memories,” he said. “The players went into the season wanting the league title and we accomplished that. And we won’t forget the Reseda game (which clinched the title). That’s what makes football such a pleasure to be a part of.”

Add 3-A demise: Meanwhile, at Sylmar, tailback Jerome Casey blamed mental breakdowns for his team’s early exit. It was thought that Sylmar had the talent to make an impact in the 3-A scheme, but the same kind of letdown that caused Sylmar losses to less-talented Monroe and Reseda plagued the Spartans in the playoffs.

“They were more disciplined than we were,” Casey said.

As for Grant? Well, Coach Bill Foster was unavailable for comment, which might make him the smartest of the four.

Add Sylmar: Casey, one of the best all-purpose backs in the City, had to sit out much of the second half because of leg cramps. He had returned the second-half kickoff 93 yards to make the score 14-10. After a subsequent 62-yard run, Casey said, his calves cramped up so badly he couldn’t even think about playing.

He came back with two minutes remaining, but the score stood 31-17 at that point. Casey finished his senior campaign with 1,825 combined rushing and receiving yards.

“I’m hurt and everything (about the loss),” Casey said. “But I’m looking forward to college.”

Larceny and lamentations: Gripes with officials seemed to be the common denominator after this week’s playoff action. Hart’s Mike Herrington woke up Saturday morning feeling as if his pocket had been picked in Paramount’s 16-14 defeat of Hart.

His tale, like Schaeffer’s, is an odd one: Hart was leading, 14-10, and driving in the fourth quarter. Faced with fourth and three, Herrington instructed quarterback Rob Westervelt to bark out a long cadence in hopes of forcing Paramount offside. In the midst of Westervelt’s long call, though, Herrington noticed 10 little Indians on Hart’s side of the ball. So, he sent in an 11th from the sidelines.

Just then, a Paramount player jumped offside. A flag flew. Another flag flew. The officials huddled, and decided that, indeed, a Paramount player was offside. Bingo, right? Hart would get the first down, chew up the clock and move to the semifinals.

Not so fast. The officials also, however, chose to view the late addition to the Hart play as a penalty in the form of deception, a little used infraction.

Herrington, simply, lost it.

“The kid was just running onto the field to his position,” Herrington said. “I kept asking him where he got the call, and he just kept saying, ‘It’s deception, coach, it’s deception.’ He never gave me an explanation.”

Instead of a first down, Hart was stopped short on the next play. Paramount took over and scored the winning touchdown with 3:50 to play, abruptly ending Hart’s season.

“That’s the bad thing about the playoffs,” Herrington said. “Only one team gets to end on a good note.”

Add Hart: Paramount Coach Ken Sutch noted after the game that his team’s win had made hollow the words of Hart’s, shall we say, confident quarterback, Rob Westervelt. Earlier in the week, Westervelt had said, in print, “We’re gonna pound them.”

After Westervelt completed 11 of 19 for 114 yards, Sutch commented: “It’s a shame no one taught him how to act.”

On Saturday, Westervelt was unusually contrite, saying that his comment was meant in private. Also, he was concerned about his coach’s reaction. “I’m sure he’s a little upset by it,” Westervelt said.

Herrington, however, was sympathetic toward his quarterback. “Rob’s just trying to rattle things up,” the coach said. “It’s good sometimes. Or it can backfire. I don’t think that it changed the outcome.”