A Rich Tradition Can Ensure a Full House at Football Finals

Dorsey High quarterback Damon Williams backed away from the line of scrimmage in the City Section 4-A Division football final last Saturday. He removed his mouthpiece, held his hands to his helmet and gestured to an official, who stopped the clock.

The scene was the rarest of the rare in a high school football game. A capacity crowd of 12,000 at El Camino College was generating too much noise for the Dorsey players to hear Williams’ cadence.

One day earlier, at Birmingham High, Chatsworth quarterback Brian Comer experienced no such problem in the 3-A final.

Unless silence is deafening.

An estimated 1,000 attended the 3-A final, which was won by Crenshaw, 27-7. Many teams draw more fans for regular-season games. The dearth of fans at the 3-A final did not pass unnoticed.

“This is my sixth football season and that was by far the poorest-attended 3-A final,” City Commissioner Hal Harkness said.

Harkness said the difference in turnout, in a word, is spelled T-R-A-D-I-T-I-O-N. Banning, Dorsey’s foe in the 4-A final, is a perpetual title contender. Chatsworth and Crenshaw, conversely, typically rank elsewhere when the first spiral is thrown in September.

“Neither team has established a history of continuously playing a high level of football,” Harkness said. “They haven’t built a following by playing well over the years.”

A crowd estimated at 33,000 attended the Southern Section Division I final last weekend at Anaheim Stadium. The start of the game between Eisenhower and Mater Dei was delayed 30 minutes to accommodate the crowd.

Factors in the Division I turnout were manifold. Entering the game, Eisenhower was ranked No. 1 in the nation by USA Today. Mater Dei has developed one of the largest followings of any school in Orange County. A crowd of 20,000 was expected.

The boisterous crowd that witnessed Dorsey’s 33-30 victory over Banning also was larger than expected. Turnout was partially attributable to the controversy fueled by Banning’s refusal to play at Dorsey during the regular season because of the fear of gang violence. Furthermore, Banning and Dorsey entered the game with two losses between them, one resulting from Banning’s forfeit to Dorsey.

It marked the second 4-A title in three years for Dorsey, which in the not-too-distant past was just another City also-ran.

“Dorsey has shown that a program that establishes a pattern of success can draw as well as any around,” Harkness said.

In 1990, Chatsworth and Crenshaw combined to win four games while playing at the 4-A level. Both teams were dropped to the 3-A level this season and entered the final with records of 9-4.

“One of the risks involved in moving teams (into different divisions) was that teams without a winning tradition might make it into the final rounds of the playoffs,” Harkness said. “That was a chance we were willing to take.”

Dispensation: Harkness terms the inconsistency a “public-relations thing,” and said the matter was decided by those ranking well above him in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

City 4-A basketball teams Westchester, Fairfax and Carson are playing in a sports festival Jan. 4-11 at South Gate High. The festival will feature games between Yusuda High of Tokyo and the City teams.

The event will be held during the City’s so-called “blackout period,” scheduled Jan. 6-12. The blackout period falls during the semester break for high schools and coaches are expressly prohibited from making contact with players during the two-week span. According to literature distributed by Harkness, contact between players and coaches is punishable by forfeiture.

Except in this case, it seems.

“The whole thing was planned before the hands-off period was finalized,” Harkness said. “All of the arrangements were made. It’s a P.R. thing and a lot of logistics were involved. I was asked not to intervene.”

The bottom line is that three teams will be playing while the other City teams are not even allowed to practice.

Fall and winter of discontent: Among major City sports, basketball is surely the one most impacted by L.A. Unified’s adoption of a year-round format for the 1991-92 school year. Many games will be played during an eight-week break between the fall and spring semesters, the latter of which begins Feb. 14.

Yet there are those who believe that the year-round calendar’s negative affect on baseball might rank a close second. Because of the eight-week break, the City baseball winter-league season began two months earlier than in previous years.

The 1991-92 winter-league season--in actuality, a fall league--began Oct. 1 and will end today. Previously, off-season play began Dec. 1 and ended in late February, a few days before the City’s preseason opener.

“It ran right into the regular season,” San Fernando Coach Steve Marden said. “It was ideal.”

A raw deal is the way Marden and his peers are describing the current off-season schedule. After today’s finale, City baseball coaches will be prohibited from making contact with players until Feb. 3. The first games are scheduled for March 4.

“The impact of this (off-season schedule) won’t be realized until after we get back in February, after an eight-week break,” Marden said. “Most teams are whipping themselves into playing form and condition right now. The kids will be on their own over the vacation.

“Will this put us all back to square one? Who knows?”

On the plus side, players, teachers and coaches have been handed a hefty vacation between semesters. Yet some folks in the San Fernando athletic department do not necessarily view the vacation as a boon.

“We’re all looking at an eight-week vacation, starting right now,” Marden said Friday as school wound down for the break. “But I don’t see any smiling faces.”

Wheels of fortune: Joe Jackson isn’t shoeless, and even if he was, it wouldn’t matter, because he sure isn’t car-less.

When Jackson was fired as boys’ basketball coach at Campbell Hall last spring, it sparked a considerable uprising on campus. Students at the normally conservative private school went so far as to carry placards in protest.

After all, Jackson led the Vikings to their first winning season and into the state playoffs.

Jackson, claiming that the terms of his contract had been breached, threatened legal action. Things then quieted considerably for several months--and for good reason.

Jackson recently received an out-of-court settlement from the school. According to the terms of the agreement, Jackson is prohibited from disclosing the amount of the settlement, yet it would seem that his bus ticket out of town fast became a ticket to ride.

According to several of Jackson’s friends, he is now the proud owner of a 1990 Jeep Cherokee with four-wheel drive, purchased with money from the settlement. Jackson, now an assistant at Valley College, evidently had enough money left over to purchase a restored 1972 Datsun 240-Z.

The kicker? Friends report that Jackson has ordered vanity license plates for the Jeep that read, “THANX CH.”

License to thrill: San Fernando basketball Coach Dick Crowell has a somewhat different philosophy concerning the tutoring of sophomore Javier Ramos. Ranting and raving are saved for the other players.

When it comes to Ramos, mum’s the word. “I don’t say a word to him (about his offense),” Crowell said. “He gets to do whatever he wants.”

Off the floor, though, Crowell has plenty of words to describe Ramos’ offensive feats. Ramos, the starting off-guard, has generated plenty of noise. In his first five games, the 5-foot-10 sharp-shooter has been held under 20 points just once and is averaging 25.2 points a game.

“He’s a better player right now than Gail Goodrich was as a sophomore,” said Crowell, who played with the former UCLA and NBA star at Poly High in 1962. “Whether Javier will continue to improve, we’ll have to see.”

Raising his game to another level, at least in terms of productivity, might be difficult. To put Ramos’ early performance in perspective, Cleveland’s Brandon Martin, bound for USC, led area City players last season with an average of 25.0 points.