By Ed Piper
Ryan Price is the Defensive Coordinator for La Jolla. These remarks were made before the Vikings' semifinal playoff game at Rancho Bernardo.
Coach Price, keys to defense tonight?
Stop the run.
That's it?
Stop the run.
Why's that so important?
They're a run-heavy team. 70 percent of the time.
Beyond that--secondary goals?
Take the ball away when they put it in the air.
Okay, looking forward to it.
By Ed Piper
"Juice" is the Associate Head Coach for the La Jolla High football team. These are remarks before the semifinals at Rancho Bernardo High Fri., Nov. 17.
Coach Juice, offensive goals?
We got to score. I know it sounds like the most basic thing you could say. But we're not going to get the ball a whole lot, they want to run the ball and hold onto the clock. We just know we have to execute when we have the ball. If we only have the ball six times, we have to score every time we have the ball. Otherwise, we're going to put ourselves in the position where they're going to just hang around.
How do you maximize those opportunities when you have the ball?
Again, it's executing. We've had a good week (of practice). We think we know what they're going to come out in. But it's just making adjustments, playing our game, executing our plays, and if we do that we'll be fine.
They were predicting more rain earlier in the week, and now it's looking a lot drier.
If it stays a little dry, we'll send the the rock around a little.
By Ed Piper
Eric Weddle is first-year head coach at Rancho Bernardo. His Broncos met La Jolla in the CIF D2 Semifinals Fri., Nov. 17. (There were multiple downpours before and during the first quarter of the game at RBHS. My notepad was soaked.) These comments were made prior to the game.
The word is you guys are going to keep it on the ground, and you're going to hold on to it for a long time.
(Playfully) That's the word on the street?
That's the word on the street. That's the word in the stadium.
If anyone sees us play, we run the ball. Any chance you have to control the ball in a playoff-type game against any opponent, that's what you want to do. Control the clock, control the line of scrimmage. Especially with a team like this, with their offense, their quarterback, the dynamics of what they try to do, you want to try to limit their opportunities.
At the day we have to block, we have to tackle, make the plays that are there to be played, and the best team will win.
You've put things together the last couple of weeks.
We've played some tough teams over the course of the season. Offensively, in quarterbacks, I think we've finally found our identity, in a sense. Our kids understand that. They're confident who we are and that's how we're going to win games. That's playing great defense, running the football, controlling the ball, and hit our shots when we're in the passing game.
We were 7-for-7 for 180 yards and a couple of touchdowns last week (in a 28-18 quarterfinal win over Bishop's). So when the opportunities are there, when teams start crowding the box, that's what we plan on doing.
La Jolla hadn't met a team like Del Norte this season. Not the Del Norte that showed up Saturday night, Nov. 25. Coming in not wildly heralded, having failed to get into the end zone in their 9-7 semifinal win over Point Loma, the Nighthawks might have been under-rated.
The Vikings weren't underestimating them. Eight-year head coach Tyler Roach knows, play the game and see what the defense (and offense) gives you. Their heads weren't in the wrong places.
Del Norte quarterback Jack Schneider, a senior, though not spectacular like the Vikes' dual-threat Jackson Diehl, was on task, focused, not making any mistakes (after the Nighthawk's fumble on their first possession), staying within the short-pass game which he worked to perfection alongside Del Norte's productive running game based around 5'7" Ryan Remigio. Freshman Anthony Mattar came in for designated plays like a Hank Bauer-like back to power for one yard.
La Jolla played a good game, once the jitters were overcome. The only problems were that, by then, the Vikings trailed 21-0 in the first quarter, 24-0 after a Trey Coleman field goal in the second quarter. And Del Norte under first-year head coach Nick Barnett was going to limit the times their opponents could get the ball on offense.
It had to be frustrating for Jackson Diehl, running back Aidan "Carolina" McGill, receiver Carson Diehl, runner/receiver Hank Hansen, receivers Nick Sebro and Kai Fukuda, and all the other names we've watched and grown to appreciate this season to fail to score on their possession starting the second half.
Then the frustration happened again later in the third period--or shall we just give the staunch Nighthawk defense their deserved plaudits?--when the white-and-black (versus Del Norte's dark blue-with-green) couldn't punch the ball into the end zone.
La Jolla couldn't surmount a 24-0 lead it gave up to Del Norte, and succumbed in the CIF Division 2 Finals at Southwestern College, 31-15, Sat., Nov. 25.
The Vikings (10-3), carrying an eight-game win streak coming into the title game, enabled Nighthawk senior quarterback Jack Schneider and his team to a 21-0 first quarter advantage.
On their first four possessions, the Vikes fumbled the ball away twice--both leading to Del Norte (now 11-2) scores--and punted two times.
But when it counted, Coach Tyler Roach's squad met a stout Nighthawk defense that stopped La Jolla on the 13-yard line on their first possession of the second half.
Again, the juggernaut Del Norte defense stopped another La Jolla drive late in the third quarter. Coach Nick Barnett's crew then employed a 17-play, 84-yard drive drive in the fourth quarter to use up a lot of the clock and score an insurance touchdown, nailing down the victory.
Quarterback Jackson Diehl and the La Jolla offense were efficient in going 80 yards in the last 22 seconds of the first half to score as time ran out. Diehl flung a 12-yard TD pass to Hank Hansen to finally get on the scoreboard and give the Vikings some hope going into halftime.
Then, when the Vikes did get the ball late in the game, 3:34 on the clock, Jackson connected in short order with his sophomore brother Carson on a 24-yard TD reception. Hansen took a pass in for the two-point conversion, making it 31-15, with 2:01 left. But by then, it was too little, too late.
There were two patterns of play for La Jolla's basketball team against Olympian--the scrambled, can't-shoot-straight activity that landed the Vikings a deficit of 28-8 early in the second quarter, and another more effective approach that saw Eli Vaz and company come back to within 36-29 late in the first half.
Which would win out?
La Jolla got thumped on the second day of the tournament they were hosting in the Big Gym, 71-49, as the Eagles employed "little ball" and saw compact guards Isaiah Aquino and Sammel Humphries go to races on steals and resulting layups, besides some key outside shooting.
The third quarter wasn't bad, from the Vikings' perspective, being outscored only 18-14. But they couldn't hang in the fourth and crucial period, dropping the 22-point decision in the end.
Aquin scored 13 points, his backcourt mate 10, but they came at crucial times. Lefty guard Michael Contreras led La Jolla with 15 points, including 7 of 10 free throws. Vaz had 12.
During the good streak in the second quarter, 6'5" forward Lance Braga and Vaz, a 5'9" guard, teamed up to score several points back-to-back and cut the Olympian lead. Braga made a basket and one, a three-point play for 33-14 after a Baranowski timeout.
Football players Nick Sebro and Marley LaFond showed up for moral support for their teammates, whom they will join after the Viking football season concludes. "JD", Jackson Diehl, the quarterback, wasn't able to make this game after attending Monday's win.
Vaz then drove for a layup, turning to the right, then the left on his push to the basket. The Eagles called a timeout with the score 33-17. Not great, but better.
Lance then shortly stepped to the free throw line and sank two free throws. Vaz hit a three from beyond the arc with 2:18 left in the period.
The pair helped decrease an Eagle lead that reached 20 (28-8) down to seven late in the second period, 36-29.
A curious circumstance meant Jake Baranowski, Paul's son, at the scorer's table, had to call out the time remaining when the clock when on the fritz with one minute left in the prior game. Point Loma won that one, 54-48, over St. Joseph's.
This continued through the nightcap. Another person at the scorer's table had to keep track of time left on the 35-second shot clock, and call those numbers out.
Photos by Ed Piper
La Jolla came out strong and steadily built a lead in the second game of the young season, the Vikings' opening game of the D3 Classic against West Hills. Coach Paul Baranowski's squad, in his 12th year at the school, took a 69-45 win Mon., Nov. 20.
After giving up the first basket, La Jolla tied and went ahead to construct a 13-3 at the 3:46 mark of the first quarter on Eli Vaz's steal at midcourt and layup. Early in the second period, Vaz deposited a pair of free throws and the Vikings led 21-13.
The bulge drew to 12, 28-16 at the half, including a shot beyond the arc by Jeremy Cromwell.
Lefty Michael Contreras began the second half with a fall-away from free throw range to go up 30-16. By the end of three periods, the hosts of the Classic led, 45-28. There was no looking back.
In attendance and on the bench for Baranowski's unit were three of the four football players still in season and looking ahead to the CIF Division 2 championship game Sat., Nov. 25: Jackson Diehl, Nick Sebro, and Marley LaFond.
It is Vikings' fans' wishes that the football players will be further delayed in joining the basketball team after the title game, which, if they win, will put them into the Southern California Regionals that follow.
Photos by Ed Piper
Photos by Ed Piper
Tudor Lacey is the long-time conditioning coach for the La Jolla water polo and swim programs. These comments were made prior to the Viking boys water polo team's 12-6 win over visiting El Segundo Tues., Nov. 14, in the first round of the Southern California Regionals.
An Associated Press newspaper clipping online from Feb. 23, 1963 reports that Tudor Lacey, then a freshman at Southern Methodist University (SMU), won the 400-yard individual medley on the first day of the Southwestern AAU swimming tournament. Lacey won the 200-yard freestyle alongside his SMU teammates, all of whom dominated the event, winning nine of 11 races. That makes Coach Lacey about 78 years old at present.
His name appears with Tom Atwell's below the scoreboard at Coggan Aquatic Complex.
Q: Tudor Lacey, strength and conditioning coach...
I work with the team for conditioning, and I have been working with Coach (Tom) Atwell for about 18 years.
Q: How did you survive that? Just kidding.
Actually, we get along really well.
Q: It looks like it.
We really do.
I'm happy with the conditioning. So we'll see how we do today.
Q: Coach, do you do weights in addition to swimming? How does water polo do that?
Coach Atwell does the weights. I just do the swimming. Depending on the week, for half an hour, three quarters of an hour, if we have a game two times a week...
Q: How long have you been a swim coach? How many decades? (laughing)
I don't know.
Q: When did you start?
I started coaching when I was in college.
Q: Which was where?
SMU. In Dallas.
Q: Are you a Southerner?
No, I'm South African.
Q: Where were you born?
In Zambia. Just south of the Congo. Ten miles south.
Q: Was your dad a businessman there?
Yeah.
Q: What type?
He was a jack-of-all-trades. Insurance, mainly. And he was also born in that part of the world.
Q: Any memories stand out?
Lots of them.
Q: What was it like?
What can I say? It's all I knew. It was great. It was all I knew. Wild, and we had a place 40 miles out of town on a river that was really, really wild. Elephants, hippos, crocodiles.
Q: Sounds pretty exotic. Did you swim there?
Yes, I swam in high school. I swam after... After high school, I went to college there. And then I got a scholarship to SMU. I swam there.
Q: Thank you, and I hope to continue the conversation.
