HIGH SCHOOL NOTEBOOK

By STEVE HENSON

Nov. 1, 2000 12 AM PT

It has been a miserable season for Chris Richards, the second-year coach at Monroe.

The Vikings have lost five games on the field, forfeited a 49-0 victory over Cleveland for using an ineligible player and had to stop a game against Canoga Park because Richards did not have emergency medical cards for his players.

Finally, a ray of sunshine fell on the Vikings.

Monroe surprised San Fernando, 9-7, with a strong defensive effort and a field goal by Marvin Cortez with eight seconds to play.

If his team could win only one game, Richardswould take a victory over San Fernando every year. The Tigers are coached by his best friend, Sean Blunt, and Richards was an All-City running back for San Fernando.

High School Sports

Steve Henson

Steve Henson is a reporter with the Fast Break sports team at the Los Angeles Times. He previously served as an assistant editor and reporter in the Sports department. Henson was a leader in digital-only newsrooms from 2007-19 as a senior editor and columnist at Yahoo Sports and as senior editor at the USA Today Sports Media Group. This is his second stint at The Times, having covered the Dodgers and UCLA as well as doing enterprise, investigative and features writing from 1985-2007. Henson was awarded first place in sports features in 2021 by the L.A. Press Club and has been honored several times by the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE) and also by the California News Publishers Assn., the Football Writers Assn. of America and U.S. Basketball Writers Assn.

HIGH SCHOOL NOTEBOOK

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