POLLITICAL FOOTBALL

The best high school football team in America plays in Anaheim on Saturday.

Says who?

Says Dave Krider, whose rankings in USA Today generate interest and controversy across the country and stir fans, coaches, principals and communities to the point that Krider wishes to issue a disclaimer.

“I don’t want somebody putting out a contract on me because their team wasn’t ranked No. 1,” Krider said. “It’s a fun thing. It’s something to talk about. It’s not brain surgery or rocket science.”

It’s not any kind of science, actually. It’s the educated guess of one man in Indiana, published in a newspaper that circulates throughout the country and around the world.

De La Salle of Concord, Calif., No. 1 in Krider’s rankings, plays Saturday at Edison Field against Mater Dei of Santa Ana, which finished atop Krider’s rankings in 1994 and ’96. The Mater Dei players from those teams proudly sport national championship rings, the inscription thanks to Krider.

“There’s no way to prove it,” Mater Dei Coach Bruce Rollinson said. “The only way to prove it is to go to a playoff system, and that will never happen.”

There is no playoff system in major college football, either, but bowls and other nonconference games provide a basis for comparing the strength of teams and conferences and, say, ranking UCLA ahead of similarly undefeated Air Force or Virginia Tech.

Rarely do high school football teams travel outside their home state--some state governing bodies forbid it--so on what basis does Krider rank De La Salle or Mater Dei ahead of the best team in, say, Virginia?

According to the National Federation of State High School Assns., 13,243 high schools fielded football teams last year. Krider simplifies the challenge of picking the best team among 50 states by dismissing 42 of them.

Krider considers California, Florida and Texas the power states in high school football, with Georgia, Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio and Pennsylvania in a second tier. Only once in the 16 years of the USA Today rankings has a team outside those eight states finished the season at No. 1, and then only after a string of upsets among the top-rated teams.

“I could pick a lot of teams in Indiana or Virginia that might score just as many points and be just as impressive,” Krider said. “There are things you can’t really prove. I think the things I use here are pretty solid.”

In the absence of competition across state lines, his criteria include traditional success at a school, college and NFL prospects and products in schools and states, and strength of competition.

“In the power states, they’re being tested pretty severely every week,” Krider said. “They might go 15-0 and play 13 really outstanding teams.”

UCLA Coach Bob Toledo, who scheduled recruiting visits around last week’s game at Texas and this week’s game at Miami, grimaced at the notion of picking a No. 1 team from thousands of high schools.

“It’s hard at the college level, and there’s only 112 of us,” Toledo said.

Still, he noted, California, Texas and Florida sent the most players to Division I colleges this year.

“The best high school football is probably played in those three states,” Toledo said.

Krider, 59, lives in La Porte, Ind., 75 miles east of Chicago. He rarely catches a game in person. Friday night, the traditional high school game night, is date night for Krider and his wife, Lois.

On Saturday morning, Krider rises before dawn and makes the first of several dozen calls to the college recruiters, high school coaches, prep editors and recruiting analysts he consults in adjusting his rankings from week to week.

“I think it’s a big responsibility,” he said, “and I take it seriously.”

In 1991, after Mater Dei beat then-No. 1 Eisenhower of Rialto, Krider added Rollinson to his call list.

“I became part of that loop,” Rollinson said. “What I learned there is, you now have an opportunity to promote your own football team.

“It’s political as all get-out. You can’t really just talk about four or five teams from one state.”

Teams that lose almost always fall completely out of the rankings. Teams that win almost always hold their ranking no matter how narrow their victory, as No. 2 Long Beach Poly did after beating Banning, 35-34, last Friday. Poly could meet Mater Dei, currently unranked, in the Southern Section Division I championship. They met in last year’s title game, won by Poly, 28-25.

“The nightmare scenario,” USA Today prep editor John Tkach said, “is De La Salle beats Mater Dei, 7-6, and Poly beats Mater Dei, 40-6.”

Tkach fields the phone calls, letters and e-mails--”some are ruder than others,” he said--from the disgruntled.

Parents demand statistical rationale for failing to include a school in the rankings. Principals plead for separate rankings for public and private schools. Folks in Louisiana lobby for No. 7 Evangel Christian of Shreveport or No. 18 West Monroe.

“This is front-page news in Monroe and Shreveport,” Tkach said.

Mostly, Tkach talks callers off the proverbial ledge. Repeat after him: This is not science.

“You can’t tell me the best team from Ohio couldn’t beat the best team from California. On any given day, they can,” Tkach said. “You’re guessing.

“This is not gospel. You have one guy doing this. It’s a question of opinion. . . . No one has ever been denied a scholarship because of how their team was ranked. It’s just to stir interest in the sport.”

De La Salle generated plenty of interest last season, when the school shattered the national record for consecutive victories, extended to 78 last Friday. The national federation lists that record but does not award or recognize any national championship.

“We are not involved in any national rankings,” said Bruce Howard, publications and communications director.

Mater Dei’s Rollinson chuckles as he recalls businessmen who urge him to attain a USA Today ranking so they can follow the team while they travel. But does De La Salle or Mater Dei--or any other team of teenagers--need the pressure generated by an artificial national ranking?

“There is added pressure,” Krider said, “but the teams that are ranked each year have added pressure already. The coaches want to win. The fans want to win. The kids want to get scholarships.

“And don’t tell me everybody on Mater Dei’s schedule doesn’t get up for Mater Dei. Don’t tell me that everybody on De La Salle’s schedule doesn’t want to be the team that ends that streak.”

If that streak survives this season, with the toughest schedule in school history, De La Salle Athletic Director Terry Eidson said he believes his team could be the best in the country. But Eidson said he couldn’t prove it, and neither could Krider.

“He does a good job of identifying the top players and the top teams,” Eidson said. “Can he scientifically knock it down to the best team in the country? I think it would be very difficult. It’s not a perfect science, not in high school.”

Then Eidson asked a question that illuminated the extent to which the rankings command attention, even from skeptics and detractors. Eidson had heard that Berwick, a Pennsylvania school with relatively low enrollment, had complained about a low ranking. Eidson wondered why Berwick should be ranked at all and assumed the previous week’s game against powerhouse St. Ignatius of Cleveland would shut Berwick up once and for all.

Imagine that: An athletic director of a high school in Northern California asked a reporter in Southern California for the result of a game between one high school in Pennsylvania and another in Ohio.

Berwick won, 30-28.

“I take it back,” Eidson said, laughing heartily. “Krider’s a genius.”

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De La Salle

Alumni

* Aaron Taylor (San Diego Chargers), Class of 1990.

* Doug Brien (New Orleans Saints), Class of 1989.

* Amani Toomer (New York Giants), Class of 1992.

Notes

* National-record 78 game win streak.

* State-record 88-game regular-season win streak.

* State-record 46-game win streak at home.

* Scored in 225 conscuetive games.

* Scored at least four touchdowns in all 78 games of current streak.

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* SATURDAY’S GAME: De La Salle vs. Mater Dei, 7:30 p.m.