It’s Saturday morning and the high school football regular season is over. Corona Centennial and Mission Viejo head coaches know they will meet in the first round Southern Section, Division 1 Final when the couples will be revealed on Sunday.
Do you start studying a video about your opponent? Are you starting to create a game plan? Do you start calling other coaches for a scout report?
Matt Logan of Centennial attended his granddaughter’s ballet rehearsal. Chad Johnson of Mission Viejo spent the morning watching university football on television while his young daughter played with his phone. See, these two intense, dedicated coaches actually live outside of football.
It is now back to work after we officially learned on Sunday that No. 5 Mission Viejo (9-1) played at No. 4 Centennial (10-0) 12 November.
“We’ve never played with each other before,” Logan said. “It’s going to be a unique and fun layout. Each of us was declared the best public school, we will find out this year. “
Johnson added: “I have a lot of respect for Matt. I played it several times at St. John Boscu. ”
This is the first year the Southern section has placed teams in the playoffs based on results this season instead of using a two-year cycle. CalPreps.com Power ratings have been used and it has a computer system designed by Ned Freeman that rates high school football teams across the country, with a set of algorithms that take into account the strength of opponents and the results of games from the current season.
There were 216 berths and 44 vacancies for 14 divisions.
The highest ranked team that did not qualify was 3-7 San Juan Capistrano San Juan Hills. The highest ranked team that did not rank with a score of 0.500 or better was 5-5 Westlake Village Westlake. The team with the best winning result that did not qualify was 7-3 Agoura.
Division 2, led by Mission Hills top seed Bishop Alemany (5-3), appears to be the most competitive group of 16 teams with any team that can win the first round.
“It’s the devil’s carrier,” Assistant Commissioner Richard Shearer said.
Section 1 seems the most one-sided.
Eight Division 1 teams are represented by 1st seed Santa Ana Mater Dei (8-0), no. 2 Bellflower St. John Bosco (9-1), no. 3 Anaheim Servite (8-2) and no. 6 Santa Margarita (6-4), all from the Trinity League. All six Trinity League teams qualified for the playoffs.
Among the stories will be public and private schools, how competitive first-round matches will be, and whether the real squad that sometimes rejects home league champions will receive support in the future. The southern section will assess each step and is ready for changes in 2022 if necessary.
An additional interest is the Division 2 game where Inglewood (8-0) will play Ventura St. Louis. Bonaventure (9-0) at Ventura College. Inglewood faces for school district investigation after a 106-0 victory across Morningside on Friday, which is challenged a national debate on sporting spirit and achieving results. The teams were supposed to meet at the start of the season, but the match was canceled due to COVID-19 protocols.
“We will accept him,” coach St. Bonaventure Joe Goyeneche said of the confrontation with Inglewood. “We are thrilled. I think it was in the cards. We should open with them and we will open with them next year. “