Competition Keeps Throwing Area Junior Colleges for Losses

L, L, W, L, L, L, W, L, W, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, W.

To L and back?

That’s the tale of San Diego community college football this season, and, to save wear and tear on your abacus, that’s four Ws and 25 Ls. 4-25.

Thought the Chargers and San Diego State were bad?

Combined, area community college teams have been outscored, 847-454. That’s almost two touchdowns per game.

Relief is in sight, though. Beginning today, the rest of the Mission Conference won’t have its San Diego brethren in the Southern Division to kick around anymore. The San Diego five, with one exception (Grossmont), begin intra-division play.

So the Southern Division finally will be registering as many Ws as Ls, and that suits some coaches to a T.

“We’re not doing as well as we hoped,” Grossmont Coach Jim Symington said, speaking on behalf of the group.

But why?

There might be as many legitimate reasons as there have been losses, but most point to conference expansion and realignment after the 1987 season. Before that, things were fine.

Since 1978, San Diego Mesa has won three conference championships. Grossmont has won two, and Southwestern (1988) and Palomar (1989) have won the past two Hall of Fame Bowl games in San Diego.

“The way it used to be--that was ideal,” Palomar Coach Tom Craft said. “And everybody liked playing each other.”

But this season, Palomar (2-4), Grossmont (1-4), Southwestern (1-5), Mesa (0-6) and San Diego City (0-6) have struggled. Palomar has been competitive--the Comets are two two-point conversions from being 4-2, and their 14-7 upset last week of Golden West, previously undefeated and ranked No. 6 in the state, saved the Southern Division from its fourth consecutive winless weekend.

Still, San Diego coaches are fretting about the conference alignment. The downward spiral of their programs underscores what they feared from the beginning of the Mission Conference’s molding: They just aren’t as good as the schools in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

“This is not a one-year thing,” Symington said. “This has been going on for the three years since we’ve been in this alignment.”

Four years ago, the Mission Conference was a fairly balanced, 10-team league composed of the five San Diego schools, four Orange County schools and Riverside Community College. Everyone seemed happy--except the powerful Los Angeles schools, which were having trouble getting nonconference opponents because no one wanted to play them.

As a solution--and as Craft put it: “for the good of community college football”--the Mission Conference expanded to 16 teams with three divisions, the Northern, Central and Southern.

That seemed fine, since each division would have its own champion and bowl game, but the conference mandated that each member play a certain number of nondivision games within the conference. For the five Southern Division teams, that meant playing five games against schools from the other two divisions.

That also meant disaster. Since the realignment, San Diego schools have gone 9-60 against Central and Northern division teams, including 1-18 this year.

“None of (the San Diego coaches) wanted to realign, but the L.A. schools had a problem,” Mesa Coach Len Smorin said. “Now we’ve got a problem.”

What to do? Suggestions range from doing nothing to secession. But each action brings up a new set of problems, Mission Conference Commissioner T. Mark Johnson said.

“When someone starts talking about leaving, there’s a domino effect throughout the state. The whole thing changes then,” Johnson said, alluding to scheduling. “We’ve done our best to make things as fair as possible in terms of scheduling. We’re trying to act in good faith in regards to all the schools we have.”

The San Diego coaches--most of whom have been involved with community college football for 10 or more years--understand the scheduling problems. But each would like the conference to allow more freedom in making their schedules, while not abandoning the Los Angeles and Orange County schools.

“I would like to play some really elite teams that are bigger and better than us,” Craft said. “But if we have to play them week after week after week before we get into our own division, we just can’t do that. It’s like if San Jose State had to play Pac-10 teams week after week. They’d be in trouble. But if they only play once in a while, they can knock somebody off.

“I don’t think the present situation is in our best interest.”

Will there be changes?

“I would suspect there would be some movement in that respect,” Symington said.

Said Smorin, “I think something will be done.”

As for the disparity, Symington said: “It’s a numbers game. The people up north have them. They just have a larger (population base) than we do. And it’s hard to compete against that week after week, year after year.”

With the passing of Proposition 13 in 1978, California high school players can now attend any community college in the state. Coaches, however, are limited to recruiting within their boundaries. That leaves San Diego at a disadvantage. Some of the northern schools have as many as 35 high schools from which to recruit. Palomar has the biggest drawing area in San Diego with 15 2-A and 3-A high schools. Grossmont has 11, Southwestern 10 and Mesa and City share 19 high schools within the city.

“I know on paper everybody has the same rules, but I’m not sure everybody abides by the same rules,” Southwestern Coach Bill Kinney said. “We do--I know all the coaches down here do--but I’m not sure if that’s true with schools in Orange County and L.A.”

Whatever the reasons, Northern and Central divisions dominate. Of the 11 conference schools outside San Diego, Mt. San Antonio has the poorest record at 3-3. Combined, they are 42-15 with all but two losses coming against each other.

“It’s been frustrating,” Southwestern’s Kinney said. “The teams we’ve lost to have a combined record of 20-5 (actually 20-6). We’ve been in every ballgame. We just haven’t been able to pull many of them out.”

That’s been the case with Grossmont, Mesa and Palomar, too.

“They’re playing some good football down there,” Johnson said. “But they’re not coming around to that winner’s circle very often. It’s nice to win once in a while.”

FAILED MISSION

Since the Mission Conference realigned into a 16-team, three-division conference before the 1988 season, San Diego County teams (the Southern Division) have not fared well.

School 1990 1989 1988 Grossmont 1-4 3-7 2-8 Palomar 2-4 7-4* 4-6 San Diego City 0-6 0-11 2-8 San Diego Mesa 0-6 4-5-1 3-7 Southwestern 1-5 2-7-1 7-4*

*--Includes bowl victory

Records in 1989 and 1988 include four games among one another. Division play this season begins today.