LJ FB: Re-leaguing

By Ed Piper

The earth just opened under La Jolla High and other members of the former Western League.

The Western League, as we know it--and the other City Conference leagues--are no more.

With the news that the leagues are being completely realigned according to power rankings, Viking football fans can now look forward to their team vying against schools of more comparable ability, beginning next August.

The City Conference has had okayed the formation of a whole new lineup of schools: La Jolla will begin competing in an as-yet unnamed new league that includes local rival University City; Serra, right down Balboa Ave.; the green and yellow of Patrick Henry; and Hoover.

I can already hear the clang of weights on the bars in strength coach Ryan Lennard's room sounding a little different.

No more will there be moans of "Why do we have to play Madison in league? They recruit."

And it's goodbye to at least the league rivalry for "the Boot" with Point Loma, which has "not recruited" football players from as far away as the South Bay for as long as I've been in San Diego.

Now, all our beloved black-and-red program needs is a new pilot to lead us into this new frontier of parity under the power rankings.

The application deadline for the new head football coach comes Jan. 31. Meanwhile, assistant coach John McColl, about whom somebody said recently, "The program wouldn't function if it weren't for John McColl," is said to be helping keep weight training going in the interim.

His son, Daniel, a forward on the LJHS basketball team, doesn't seem to be showing any ill effects from the limbo situation. He scored well against Bishop's in their rivalry game Wed., Jan. 20. Nick Hammel, his teammate on both the football and basketball teams, just keeps rolling along, as well.

Cathedral Catholic and St. Augustine went where they should be under the new alignment: They will face off against each other in the football reconfiguration, with the "Madhouse" boys of Madison and Point Loma, along with fifth-wheel Mira Mesa.

Mission Bay goes bye-bye, too, joined up with Lincoln, Scripps Ranch, Morse, and Christian in yet another league. The old names of the leagues will reportedly be kept: Western, Eastern, Central. They just haven't been assigned yet.

We'll have to wait to see on basketball. That's not necessarily going to be reconfigured before next season. I don't know the status on that. I dipped my toe into the inner workings of CIF with attendance at my first Coordinating Council meeting recently. But that still doesn't get me up to speed on when basketball will be realigned according to power rankings.

The good part of the earthquakian shift is that La Jolla, if it chooses, can still schedule its more-talented, long-time nemeses as part of its non-league football schedule. With four league opponents, as in the previous alignment, that leaves space for five or six games against teams from other leagues.

For La Jolla, playing the likes of Henry, Serra, and UC means catching one's breath, starting over under a new coach, and building under parity. That's a positive move, in my book.

An issue the new head coach will have to deal with is the number of bodies in the football program: How will he draw a larger number from the entire LJHS student population? We're not a Bishop's or Country Day that has to employ six or seven players on both offense and defense due to a small student body.

Another issue playing itself out across the nation is boys and their parents deciding whether they're going to play football, in view of the growing discussion over concussions and CTE, the condition that has been found in the brains of former NFL players. How many dads, who played football themselves in their school days, will prohibit their sons from playing? How many boys will just choose lacrosse or soccer or baseball or another sport as a safer choice?