Football Champions Try to Fill Schedule

Wilmington Banning’s football team peaked right on schedule, and the result was an impressive victory over defending champion Carson in the City Section championship game on Dec. 8.

Banning Coach Ed Lalau is already pondering next season’s nonleague schedule, which includes open dates in the first and fifth weeks.

Banning needs opponents to bookend games against two-time defending Southern Section Division I champion Long Beach Poly, Crenshaw and Santa Fe Springs St. Paul, all of which it played this season.

Lalau said he might look toward the San Diego area for opponents.

“Now that we’ve won the City championship, I don’t think anyone is going to want to play us,” Lalau said. “We definitely don’t want a bye. We might have to play USC.”

Lalau said Banning might have won its second consecutive major-division City title were it not for a change in the playoff selection format last season. In 1999, all teams that won or tied for league titles were placed in the 16-team City Championship division, regardless of the strength of the league.

Four of the section’s eight league races ended in ties. Banning, which finished third in the powerful Marine League, was bumped to the weaker Invitational division and won a title it considered a consolation prize.

The selection format was revised this year.

“I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that if they hadn’t changed the format [in 1999], we could have been going for our third title in a row next year,” Lalau said.

Long Beach Poly will be trying to win its third consecutive Southern Section title next season.

Poly defeated Loyola, 16-13, in the title game Dec. 9 when running back Hershel Dennis scored on an 11-yard pass play in overtime.

Poly is trying to find an opponent for the fifth week next season. The Jackrabbits open against Westchester and then play Banning, Harbor City Narbonne and Fontana.

Poly Coach Jerry Jaso said he would welcome the opportunity to play a team such as Concord De La Salle, which has won 113 consecutive games, if the game was played in Southern California.

“We have no interest in traveling,” Jaso said. “There’s just too much that goes into making a trip like that. The only way we would do that is if somebody paid the freight for the whole trip.”