Result Affects Playoff Pairings

The final week of the regular season wreaked havoc on the Southern Section football playoff pairings, which were released Sunday.

Once-beaten Long Beach Poly survived the section polls and was No. 1 in the marquee Division I, and undefeated Mission Viejo and Sherman Oaks Notre Dame were top-seeded in Divisions II and III, respectively.

However, Santa Margarita’s 20-15 upset of Los Angeles Loyola on Friday shook the Division I landscape.

With Loyola’s loss, Los Alamitos (9-1) moved from fifth in the section poll to become the second-seeded team, Loyola (8-2) dropped to third and Colton (9-1) -- champion from the Citrus Belt League and ranked no higher than sixth all season -- moved into fourth. Colton will face Santa Margarita (5-5), which became playoff eligible by virtue of its upset of Loyola.

Loyola, which tied Santa Ana Mater Dei for the Serra League title, must face a stumbling Huntington Beach Edison (6-4) in what figures to be the premier game of the first round. Edison was ranked seventh in the division, but lost Friday to Anaheim Esperanza, 14-10. For finishing third in the Sunset League, Esperanza (7-3) will play Mater Dei (8-2), which was ranked third in the division but is unseeded, with the winner facing Colton or Santa Margarita. Mater Dei beat Santa Margarita, 7-6, in league play.

Most intriguing about Division II is undefeated Mission Viejo’s second-round game. The Diablos could face Newhall Hart (6-4), the team that upset Mission Viejo in last season’s championship game.

Hart was ranked third in the division but lost to fourth-ranked Canyon Country Canyon on Friday, 21-17.

Valencia (9-1), the Foothill League champion, is seeded second, followed by Baseline League champion Chino (9-1) and Foothill runner-up Canyon (9-1).

Because Valencia and Canyon were seeded, Hart and the Foothill League’s fourth-place team, Saugus (6-4), had to be put in different quarter brackets. Hart was put up against Glendora (8-2), the second-place team from the Sierra League, which was deemed weaker than South Coast runner-up San Clemente (8-2), which will face Saugus.

“We can’t set the draw by looking at second-round games,” said Rob Wigod, assistant commissioner in charge of football. “If you put a third-place team in a worse spot than the fourth-place team, you’re not doing what you’re supposed to do.”

Other top-seeded teams, in descending order, were Ventura St. Bonaventure in Division IV, Corona Centennial, Orange Lutheran, El Monte Arroyo, Phelan Serrano, Anaheim Western, Lompoc, Westlake Village Oaks Christian, Ontario Christian and Anza Hamilton.