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Los Angeles Times
27-05-2025
- Sport
- Los Angeles Times
Prep Rally: High school football is changing, but for the better or for the worse?
Hi, and welcome to another edition of Prep Rally. Whether you've been paying attention or not, high school football is changing. Let's discuss. Rolling your eyes has been the theme if you follow college football and high school football. Changes keep happening because rules are in flux regarding name, image and likeness. Transfer numbers keep growing. Agents are picking up clients who are teenagers. Parents are examining options. Coaches are adjusting on the fly. It's the best of times and the worst of times. Many believe things will settle when court cases are finalized. Others believe amateur football has been changed forever. Here's a look at some of the issues, good and bad, that are affecting the high school football world. Devin Gonor of El Camino Real proved Saturday at Dodger Stadium that trusting the process still works. He played on the freshman team, then the junior varsity team for two years. He waited his turn, made his varsity debut last season as a junior and this season is 11-1 and pitched a three-hit shutout in a 2-0 win over Venice to give El Camino Real its 10th City Section Open Division title. Here's a look at how the Royals did it. Carson won its first ever City Section title in baseball by taking the Division I crown with a 3-1 comeback win over rival Banning at Dodger Stadium. Here's the report. The final week of the Southern Section season begins Tuesday with semifinals in Division 1 featuring Corona at St. John Bosco and Crespi at Santa Margarita. Here's a report on the quarterfinals that saw four close games. It also was the week Seth Hernandez of Corona hit two three-run home runs and struck out 10 in an impressive playoff performance. He'll pitch Tuesday. Here's a report. And Venice's Canon King went five for five in a semifinal win over Sylmar. Here's the report. Here's the complete Tuesday schedule. It will be El Modena playing Norco for the Southern Section Division 1 softball championship this weekend in Irvine. El Modena came through earlier in the week with a comeback semifinal win over Sherman Oaks Notre Dame. Here's the report. On Saturday, Norco defeated Ayala and El Modena knocked off Temescal Canyon to reach the final in a season where hitters have had the advantage over pitchers. Here's the report. The City Section has its semifinals Wednesday with Granada Hills hosting Venice and San Pedro hosting Carson. The championship game will be played Saturday at Cal State Northridge. Birmingham football standout Antrell Harris was one of the stars at the City Section track and field championships, winning the 100 and 200. He's headed this weekend to compete in the state championships at Buchanan High in Clovis. The weather report is for temperatures in the triple digits. Here's a report from the City championships. The Southern Section held its Masters Meet, and RJ Sermons of Rancho Cucamonga was the top qualifier in the 200 and has one more week of high school competition left before he heads off to play football at USC. Here's the report. Joseph Wong of Granada Hills won the City Section golf championship. Here's the report. Grant Leary of Crespi won the Southern Section individual golf championship with a 66 for a one-stroke victory. Here's a roundup of Southern Section team champions. Here's a look at Leary. Mira Costa has qualified from Southern California to compete in the first state championship in boys volleyball Saturday at Fresno City College. The Mustangs will face Archbishop Mitty from San Jose. Here's the compete schedule of state championship matchups and results from regional finals. Catcher Trent Grindlinger of Huntington Beach has changed his commitment from Mississippi State to Tennessee. . . . Former Bishop Amat football coach Steve Hagerty will become athletic director at West Covina. . . . Ethan Damato is leaving Laguna Beach to become girls water polo coach at JSerra. . . . Connor Ohl, a junior at Newport Harbor, has committed to Stanford for water polo. . . . Oliver Muller is the new boys soccer coach at Oaks Christian. . . . YULA and Shalhevet, two schools that pulled out of the Southern Section baseball playoffs to participate in a Jewish tournament in Ohio, have been placed on probation and banned from next year's playoffs for violating Southern Section rules about outside participation during the season. Here's an opinion piece on how the decision by the two schools will hurt coaches and athletes. . . . Former Chatsworth football coach Marvin Street has accepted a teaching position at El Camino Real and will become the junior varsity head coach. . . . Loyola running back Sean Morris has committed to Northwestern. . . . Kevin Reynolds, the basketball coach at Villa Park for 30 years, died Friday morning, the school announced. He was 59. He had been diagnosed with cancer. His teams won 634 games in his coaching career. . . . John Quick, who was a longtime basketball coach in the South Bay, has died. . . . Loyola's James Dell'Amico has committed to Pepperdine baseball. . . . Former Tesoro football coach Matt Poston is the new athletic director at San Clemente. . . . The CIF state championships in tennis will be held Saturday in Fresno. Irvine University has qualified. ... Darius Spates is the new athletic director at Verbum Dei. He's a 2012 graduate. Harvard-Westlake has produced some outstanding pitchers who went on to the major leagues, but Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Chicago Cubs is the Wolverines' first breakthrough every day player. As a center fielder with electric speed, he has come into his own this season to become an All-Star candidate. He used to be a teammate of Drew Bowser, who went to Stanford instead of signing out of high school and is now working his way up in the minors. Crow-Armstrong entered last week hitting .290 with 12 home runs. He hit a two-run home run Friday against former Sherman Oaks Notre Dame pitcher Hunter Greene of the Reds. His senior year got cut short in 2020 because of the pandemic. Here's an interview with Crow-Armtrong from that year and how he kept his focus on the future. Here's a story from 2019 on how he had become a hitting machine. From the Washington Post, a story on what a rowing coxswain does. From the Los Angeles Times, a story on UC Irvine baseball coach Ben Orloff, a Simi Valley High graduate. From the Los Angeles Times, a story on the new Compton High campus opening this fall with fantastic athletic facilities. Have a question, comment or something you'd like to see in a future Prep Rally newsletter? Email me at and follow me on Twitter at @latsondheimer. 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Los Angeles Times
04-05-2025
- Sport
- Los Angeles Times
May Madness arrives as high school sports season enters final month
May Madness has arrived for high school sports. It's the final month of the 2024-25 season, with lots of spring championships to be won and preparation for the fall football season under way. Let's examine the calendar and potential news to be made. The Southern Section finals are Saturday at Mt. San Antonio College with the City Section finals the same day at L.A. Valley College. The state championships are May 15-17 at Clovis West. All eyes will be on four-year Santa Margarita standout Teagan O'Dell before she heads off to California to begin her college career with the Golden Bears. She has dominated in Division 1 and is hoping to break more records while leading her team to a sixth straight girls' state championship. Palisades won the boys' and girls' City Section championships this past week. The Southern Section will hold its girls' finals on May 16 at El Modena and the boys' finals on May 17 at El Modena. Loyola is seeded No. 1 in boys and Mira Costa is No. 1 in girls. Corona is 26-2 and atop the Southern Section power rankings. Playoff seedings will be announced on May 12 and the championship games will be played May 30 and 31 at Cal State Fullerton and Blair Field in Long Beach. Division 1 will have its strongest 32-team bracket ever. Regional championships are June 7. It's a last chance to see Corona pitcher Seth Hernandez before he goes No. 1, No. 2 or No. 3 in baseball's amateur draft this summer. He has 88 strikeouts and three walks in 42 1/3 innings. The Panthers also have another likely top-10 selection in shortstop Billy Carlson. The City Section championships are set for May 24 at Dodger Stadium. Playoff pairings are announced on May 10. Either Birmingham or El Camino Real will be the No. 1 seed as they battle it out for the West Valley League championship with a two-game series this week. Venice is 24-2 and looking good for a top-four seed. The Open Division playoffs change from 12 teams to eight teams and playoff games scheduled for May 14 and May 20 make it possible for a team to use a single pitcher to get to Dodger Stadium. 'It's not who has the best team but who has the best pitcher,' Birmingham coach Matt Mowry said of the scheduling. Norco, Rosary and Orange Lutheran look like the teams to beat in Southern Section softball. Pairings come out on May 12. The finals are May 30-31 in Irvine. With the absence of a dominant pitcher, the hitters have a chance to lead their team to a championship, and few have been better than Orange Lutheran's Kai Minor, an Oklahoma commit. In the City Section, who wouldn't want to see a third straight final between Granada Hills and Carson? Last season Carson won on a 14th-inning walk-off home run. The final will be played May 31 at a college field to be announced. San Pedro has won the Marine League title over Carson, so beware of the Pirates. Mira Costa is the No. 1 seed in the Southern Section Division 1 playoffs that conclude May 16-17 at Cerritos College. The regional playoffs are the following week, then the state championships May 31 at Santiago Canyon College. The City Section championships will be held May 17 at Birmingham. Venice received the No. 1 seed on Thursday for the Open Division tournament. Palisades won its 16th consecutive City Section boys' tennis championship for legendary coach Bud Kling, who has won 53 combined boys' and girls' titles. Imagine where he finds room to store all the championship plaques. Irvine University and Beckman are the favorites to win a Southern Section Open Division title. The finals are May 16 at the University of Redlands. This month schools are ending spring practices by holding college showcases and playing seven-on-seven competitions against other schools. One of the most intriguing should take place Tuesday at Sierra Canyon, where Newbury Park and quarterback Brady Smigiel will be facing the Trailblazers' talented secondary, led by USC commit Madden Riordan. Long Beach Millikan is hosting the first big seven-on-seven event on May 17 that will feature 20 teams. This month, the National Federation of State High School Assns. will release its first national rules for girls' flag football. It will have a big influence in California, with special teams used for the first time (punting) and defenses allowed to rush from one yard back of the line of scrimmage instead of seven last year. Coaches say that will lead to fewer touchdowns and fewer long passes. The Southern Section track and field finals are set for May 17 at Moorpark High, followed by the Masters Meet on May 24. The City Section finals will be May 22 on Birmingham's new Mondo track. The state championships are May 30-31 at Buchanan High in Clovis. The Arcadia Invitational was a good sneak peek for athletes to watch, including Servite's group of young sprinters, Temecula Valley's Jack Stadlman in the 400, Santa Margarita's Leo Francis in the long jump and Aliso Niguel's Jaslene Massey in the girls' shotput. Bishop Alemany sophomore Demare Dezeurn ran the second fastest 100 meters in the state this year when he won the Mission League finals in 10.32 seconds on Thursday. The City Section championships will be held May 21 at Harding Golf Course. Luke Schultz of Palisades is back to defend his individual title. The Southern Section team finals are May 19-20, followed by the individual final on May 22. The state championships are June 3 at Poppy Hills in Pebble Beach. Watch to see if St. Francis freshman Jaden Soong can contend for an individual title.
