Serra 24, DLS 21 Final

[Cossacks]

42 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

First, I’m not saying there’s not scuffling — my only point is that I personally think it’s ridiculous to come after JA at this stage.  
 

second, the only point you’re really making that doesn’t square with my prior post is the loss to Folsom last year in rematch.  That regression appears to be isolated to me — the rest of your evidence is more early season scuffling 

third, as much as we might feel otherwise as fans, DLS isn’t going to participate in the modern arms race.  We knew that beforehand.  Their bigger problem bs their better teams from my perspective is they really don’t have ANY of those guys.  Their best teams usually got 2-3 nuggets per class that probably came to dls only because of football.  With dls playing studs early and both ways, those guys can represent about half the guys on the field at any one time at that rate.  They conditioned to be able to do that and didn’t normally run into guys whose reserves had power5 offers until playing in SBGs from 2013 forward it against an STA etc preseason.  I really don’t see any of those guys on the team.  Flanagan is a stud but he’s a local parochial kid that was tracking to dls from grade school.  I don’t have insight but it seems to me that they’ve tightened up their admissions in that area to be more like the talent from ‘04 thru ‘08, where Lad went 56-10-2, including ties vs Clayton valley and Palma and 2 losses to Clovis west (now a NorCal team).  JA’s last team that was as talented as DLS’s best 10 or even 20 teams was 2015 and he did just fine in ‘13-‘15 with those studs (1 SBG win vs #2 in country and 2 respectable losses vs vastly superior rosters 

Lastly, who are you going to get to “win” better than they do?  I doubt I’d like most of your ideas. 

Yes, they’re scuffling and It’s JA’s responsibility — he also still has a team that is likely among top 1% in country and, by all accounts, is leading them the right way.  

 

9 minutes ago, Atticus Finch said:

No, they barely survived early NorCal games when they weren't that good (2008-09) or isolated games against the other best team in NorCal (2011, 2013).

Otherwise, it was pretty much steamrollings.

But we need more hyper-improvement theory talk.

 

 

[Atticus Finch]

21 hours ago, Cossacks said:

That’s not correct. Have seen De La Salle play since ‘83. Their execution under Lad even early in the season was much much better, that’s not even debatable at this point.

Pop doesn't know anything about it so he just spouts cliches.

[Atticus Finch]

16 hours ago, PopsNW said:

losing to a Lakeland team early that wasn’t as good or fast as the Crenshaw team they beat later 

😄

[Belly Bob]

59 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

[...] my only point is that I personally think it’s ridiculous to come after JA at this stage.  

third, as much as we might feel otherwise as fans, DLS isn’t going to participate in the modern arms race. [...]

Lastly, who are you going to get to “win” better than they do?  I doubt I’d like most of your ideas. [...]

I don't think JA should be fired. I think DLS should start playing better football. They're becoming an unremarkable program. 

I don't think DLS should participate in the modern arms race. Do you? If so, I doubt I'd like most of your ideas.

[Belly Bob]

4 minutes ago, Atticus Finch said:

😄

Crazy

[Belly Bob]

5 minutes ago, Atticus Finch said:

😄

Moreover, if I remember correctly, it was 14-7 Crenshaw late in the 2Q before D Thomas was injured. 

[PopsNW]

1 hour ago, Atticus Finch said:

No, they barely survived early NorCal games when they weren't that good (2008-09) or isolated games against the other best team in NorCal (2011, 2013).

Otherwise, it was pretty much steamrollings.

But we need more hyper-improvement theory talk.

You’re bringing the term “hyper improvement” into play — all I’m saying is that scuffling early is more normal than an aberration (and you’re omitting many years from ‘04) and they don’t scuffle late often at all (‘06, ‘21…?)

if you want to call it hyper improvement I won’t argue 

 

[PopsNW]

52 minutes ago, Belly Bob said:

I don't think JA should be fired. I think DLS should start playing better football. They're becoming an unremarkable program. 

I don't think DLS should participate in the modern arms race. Do you? If so, I doubt I'd like most of your ideas.

Personally, if it were me in these times and I were DLS’s principle, I’d give the coach something like 2 academic exceptions per year and help justify it with added diversity — really the same thing that happened more or less for most of their more successful years.  I think dls can compete with pretty much anyone at that level of accommodation, which seems imminently more mainstream than it did a decade ago.  Dls has gotten tighter on their admissions while some others have gone Katy, Bar the Door.  If dls doesn’t want to compete in that way, I don’t think it’s fair to hold JA accountable — he’s doing as fine atm as Lad did for 5-6 years with same sort of foster before the era the Superteams.  
 

you are a dls fan from Indiana (or at least reside currently in boilermaker territory) with no association with the school, right?  You hopped on bandwagon 10-12 years ago when they were dominating CA with teams that still wouldn’t even be competitive in todays SBGs.  It seems to me that you want them to be at least as aggressive as I’m suggesting, maybe more???

[PopsNW]

55 minutes ago, Belly Bob said:

Moreover, if I remember correctly, it was 14-7 Crenshaw late in the 2Q before D Thomas was injured. 

It was 14-0 at one point, then Dls scored 28 unanswered and would have been 35 had dls not taken 3 knees inside the Crenshaw 10 at the end.  Crenshaw had lots of other talent still on field (including at least 2 USC starters, LB and OL that went Nfl — a WR to Utah etc).  
 

give the black mamba credit — he made a couple of big-time plays before dls clamped down 

[Cossacks]

15 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

You’re bringing the term “hyper improvement” into play — all I’m saying is that scuffling early is more normal than an aberration (and you’re omitting many years from ‘04) and they don’t scuffle late often at all (‘06, ‘21…?)

if you want to call it hyper improvement I won’t argue 

 

Have you watched any of their SBG’s the last few years against MD and SJB? To be competitive they have to play almost perfect  football.
 

They have had fumbles (unforced many times) bad hikes, poor tackling and angles, false starts and other silly penalties. So when you start out 1st and 20 or 2nd and 15 and you don’t have much of a passing threat, you are way behind the 8 ball. This has been a theme in the JA era and those are late season games, not early season jobs.

Didn’t see the beginning of the game the other night, but didn’t DLS fumble on like the 2nd play? I did see them with a chance to seal the game, not execute the screen pass to Greer. The Atari Callen version of DLS converts those big game 3rd down plays (wassup @HurricaneNick😁). This version drops the ball with no one around.

Im saying right now this is a great high school football program, no more no less. But not top 50 elite by any means.

 

[PopsNW]

10 minutes ago, Cossacks said:

Have you watched any of their SBG’s the last few years against MD and SJB? To be competitive they have to play almost perfect  football.
 

They have had fumbles (unforced many times) bad hikes, poor tackling and angles, false starts and other silly penalties. So when you start out 1st and 20 or 2nd and 15 and you don’t have much of a passing threat, you are way behind the 8 ball. This has been a theme in the JA era and those are late season games, not early season jobs.

Didn’t see the beginning of the game the other night, but didn’t DLS fumble on like the 2nd play? I did see them with a chance to seal the game, not execute the screen pass to Greer. The Atari Callen version of DLS converts those big game 3rd down plays (wassup @HurricaneNick😁). This version drops the ball with no one around.

Im saying right now this is a great high school football program, no more no less. But not top 50 elite by any means.

 

I don’t disagree with any of that except that Atari Callan is a legend from teams that won six consecutive MNCs — let’s not go back to the streak for comparisons as I think we’d both agree the current talent levels are ‘04-‘08 ish, maybe a bit better but the comp got a LOT better 

I think the last SBG I watched was the Henry T’eo team — he may have been the best dls player since the streak teams and he was injured for SBG.  Besides moving from the area, getting on with life, etc, I didn’t feel the urge to see if they can attain a moral victory and stay within 21.  The outcome wasn’t in doubt after 2015 season with Boss/ Asiasi — dls hasn’t had that talent since and socal has had two teams that would beat any prior socal team ever by 21+
 

if we stay comparing apples to apples, I think we’re fairly in agreement 

 

[PopsNW]

22 minutes ago, Cossacks said:

 

Im saying right now this is a great high school football program, no more no less. But not top 50 elite by any means.

 

Specific to this, I agree

I said earlier that I think they are likely still a top 1% team -- mathematically, that means I think they're still likely in top 140-145, which roughly equates to #3/4 in NorCal most years.  Maybe a bit better, but top 50 seems a stretch.  Could be a bit worse.  My point being they're still a very good football team, just not as elite as the best 2/3 or so of DLS teams of the last 30 have been.

[Atticus Finch]

42 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

You’re bringing the term “hyper improvement” into play

It's only your favorite term and one that is preposterous on it's face.

[Atticus Finch]

43 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

and they don’t scuffle late often at all (‘06, ‘21…?)

Because the teams they played "late" were either NCS slappies or games they were underdogs and therefore wouldn't be considered a scuffle.

[Belly Bob]

31 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

you are a dls fan from Indiana (or at least reside currently in boilermaker territory) with no association with the school, right?  You hopped on bandwagon 10-12 years ago when they were dominating CA with teams that still wouldn’t even be competitive in todays SBGs.  It seems to me that you want them to be at least as aggressive as I’m suggesting, maybe more???

I'm from Southern CA and I went to college in the Bay Area, where I would take the BART to see them play at home. I've been following the program since I watched them beat MD in the '90s.

I don't want them to be aggressive in their admissions policies. 

I know there are a lot of reasons why they haven't had the same success they had during the '90s and early 2000s. I don't want sloppy football to be one of those reasons. 

[PopsNW]

To Whom it May Concern:

DLS's early season struggles have been well documented, but since it seems like everyone has forgotten:

1992-2001 151-0, didn't play SBGs and only started doing intersectional powers in latter half.  Teams were loaded with talent, especially relative to the times (most players in the NFL before STA took the crown sometime in late 00s I believe.  After that:

2004

Opened the year with 19 and 18 point losses before a tie to small NorCal school Palma and later tied Clayton Valley (and took another L vs a very good MV team).  Ended the year with a 41-0 win over Amador Valley for NCS Championship.  The beat a Pitt team in the semis 31-6 that earlier beat that same Clayton Valley team 43-7.  That's a 60 point differential using CV late vs early.

2005

Took early losses to Clovis West and MV teams that weren't either on nearly as good as prior year's and just barely beat small school Palma again 21-14.  Outscored their 3 opponents in NCS play-offs 124-14, including an undefeated San Leandro team in finals.

2006

Was an exception to rule and contributed to this being probably the most overrated DLS team ever when they were #1 at USAT entering SBG, where they performed badly.  Lad has said he didn't prepare that team well for the SBG (the SBGs were in their inaugural year and, in hindsight, he felt they "relaxed" (not his exact words, but to that effect) prior to Canyon.  Canyon stands out as possibly the only game Lad ever lost as the favorite.

2007

No bumps in 2007 either and they evened their SBG record at 1-1 vs a very good CC team who out-D1'd them on roster something like 15-2.  The asterik here vs the trend is that their pre-season line-up was not very good at all.  A 7-4 Serra team they beat by 12 was probably the best of the bunch, along with a 4-6 Loyola, small school Palma, and an MV team that had regressed to 6-4-1 from #2 in the country 2 years prior.

2008

Bad scuffling early.  Game 1 should have been a loss to an 8-4 Serra team (that's the game they trailed by 14 with a few minutes left and Teron ran a fumbled tying PAT in for 2 and the win.  Game 2 is a 6 point win over a 6-5 Loyola team and Game 3 was a loss to DBP where they just needed a first down to win on final drive.  They lost in SBG that year, but to IMHO the best SoCal team of the 00s (a CC team that featured Vontaze Burfict at MLB and soon-to-be Heisman candidate Taylor Martinez as a senior transfer QB (replacing the Arizona commit from '07).

2009

DLS got crushed by DBP (no shame as that was their MNC year, but it was 30-6), lost close to a good/ not great Lakeland team, and trailed a 6-6 Serra team 7-0 at half before winning 14-7.  That team crushed SoCal #1/ national Top 5 in SBG.

2010

My favorite DLS team didn't scuffle much, but was in a dogfight with oft-ridiculed Monte Vista in game #2 (tied at half and end of 3 before winning 28-21).  That Monte Vista team wasn't nearly as good as the undefeated, national top 5 Service team DLS beat generously 48-8 (was 42-0 one play into 2nd half and a full quarter before Service got it's first 1st down vs JV call-ups).

2011

Scuffled badly in 2 of the first 3.  Survived a missed PAT vs a very good Bells team in opener and then pissed their pants vs STA in FL a couple of weeks later.  This year's scuffling could be more attributable to injuries/ etc than others as their star/ Elite 11 QB was injured at the Elite 11 camp and really could not throw the ball as well as he did prior 2 years for first month of that season, their #1 RB/ WSU commit was injured and missed almost whole year, and their #2 RB (sophomore all-state DB) was dismissed from team and left school, and their #3 RB got hurt in 1st half of game.  I'm not trying to take away STA's win -- they deserved it, but DLS did not give them their best shot as they were dealing with typical early issues.  This team figured it out, rolled thru NCS including and dominated Socal #1/ national top 5 Westlatke 35-0 in SBG.

2012 (Lad's last year as HC)

Team trailed a Mullen team that wound up 6-5 in CO at half and barely bested a decent St Mary's team in their first 3 games.  At end of year, they rolled a very good CC team by 20 in SBG.

 

The pattern continues after 2012, but I thought I'd put the focus on Lad's teams post-streak to demonstrate that DLS just didn't start struggling early under JA.  There were early struggles more often than not, usually more than a game or two and with exception of 2006, they met or exceeded expectations of a top team at year end.

[PopsNW]

41 minutes ago, Atticus Finch said:

Because the teams they played "late" were either NCS slappies or games they were underdogs and therefore wouldn't be considered a scuffle.

Just for sake of discussion, I won't defend pre-SBG late quality of comp, but that was only '04 and '05 in by comparison above and it's still relevant for the common opponent "hyper-improvement."

Once SBGs started, you're just sort of being a dick.  They played SoCal's best every year (or arguably so) and that qualifies as a quality opponent for anyone on here except you.  They were usually ranked in the national top 5 by week 16, so when you say "slappy", I think everyone knows that's just you being you.

[PopsNW]

32 minutes ago, Belly Bob said:

I'm from Southern CA and I went to college in the Bay Area, where I would take the BART to see them play at home. I've been following the program since I watched them beat MD in the '90s.

I don't want them to be aggressive in their admissions policies. 

I know there are a lot of reasons why they haven't had the same success they had during the '90s and early 2000s. I don't want sloppy football to be one of those reasons. 

Gotcha.  I thought I remembered you sort of adopting them from afar.  I didn't start watching until '08 SBG (my oldest son had just decided he wanted to go there instead of Monte Vista), but I'll put my DLS historian badge up against most of the old-timers that had been around much longer.  One of my best buddies was a freshman Lad's first year and captain (as a 175# all-NorCal NT) his first undefeated team in 1982.  

I moved around a lot growing up, but spent 3 years within a commute of the Purdue campus (tiny little school near Frankfort called Clinton Prairie)

[Atticus Finch]

7 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

DLS's early season struggles have been well documented, but since it seems like everyone has forgotten:

DLS struggles with the best teams they play.

And they play them at the beginning and end of the season.

[Atticus Finch]

8 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

2004

Opened the year with 19 and 18 point losses before a tie to small NorCal school Palma and later tied Clayton Valley (and took another L vs a very good MV team).  Ended the year with a 41-0 win over Amador Valley for NCS Championship.  The beat a Pitt team in the semis 31-6 that earlier beat that same Clayton Valley team 43-7.  That's a 60 point differential using CV late vs early.

2005

Took early losses to Clovis West and MV teams that weren't either on nearly as good as prior year's and just barely beat small school Palma again 21-14.  Outscored their 3 opponents in NCS play-offs 124-14, including an undefeated San Leandro team in finals.

These two teams weren't any good so it's a moot point.

The pre-SBG teams played all of their quality opponents at the beginning of the season. Any improvement that you claim occurred is just a result of losing to good teams early and then beating crappy teams late.

Beating San Leandro, 14-0, in 2005 should be enough to prove that they weren't that good.

[PopsNW]

Just now, Atticus Finch said:

DLS struggles with the best teams they play.

And they play them at the beginning and end of the season.

This isn't accurate.

I've well documented that DLS often struggles early against whoever they're playing in 1st 3 games.

Usually, since '07 or so, one or two of those teams is on par with who they might play in an SBG and they're much more likely to struggle vs them than anyone late -- the only SBG performance that really warrants an apology is '06, DLS either beat a great team or played respectably vs a very great team otherwise.

Of all those games I listed above from '04 to '12 (Lad's last season), only Canyon '06 counterbalances the early underachievements.

[Atticus Finch]

17 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

2006

Was an exception to rule and contributed to this being probably the most overrated DLS team ever when they were #1 at USAT entering SBG, where they performed badly.  Lad has said he didn't prepare that team well for the SBG (the SBGs were in their inaugural year and, in hindsight, he felt they "relaxed" (not his exact words, but to that effect) prior to Canyon.  Canyon stands out as possibly the only game Lad ever lost as the favorite.

Bold claim to make that De La Salle weren't favorites against Bellevue or Clovis West (twice).

[Atticus Finch]

19 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

2008

Bad scuffling early.  Game 1 should have been a loss to an 8-4 Serra team (that's the game they trailed by 14 with a few minutes left and Teron ran a fumbled tying PAT in for 2 and the win.  Game 2 is a 6 point win over a 6-5 Loyola team and Game 3 was a loss to DBP where they just needed a first down to win on final drive.  They lost in SBG that year, but to IMHO the best SoCal team of the 00s (a CC team that featured Vontaze Burfict at MLB and soon-to-be Heisman candidate Taylor Martinez as a senior transfer QB (replacing the Arizona commit from '07).

No scuffing. Just weren't very good.

[Atticus Finch]

22 minutes ago, PopsNW said:

2009

DLS got crushed by DBP (no shame as that was their MNC year, but it was 30-6), lost close to a good/ not great Lakeland team, and trailed a 6-6 Serra team 7-0 at half before winning 14-7.  That team crushed SoCal #1/ national Top 5 in SBG.

Also no scuffing. Just not that good.

And saying that they crushed Crenshaw is funny. A not-even-top-100 in calpreps is now a top 5 national team, too.

[PopsNW]

2 minutes ago, Atticus Finch said:

These two teams weren't any good so it's a moot point.

The pre-SBG teams played all of their quality opponents at the beginning of the season. Any improvement that you claim occurred is just a result of losing to good teams early and then beating crappy teams late.

Beating San Leandro, 14-0, in 2005 should be enough to prove that they weren't that good.

I've sort of conceded your point that I won't use NCS Championship wins as proof of late season pistons humming, but again, use common opponent:

2004 Early

Clayton Valley 17. DLS 17

Pittsburg 43 Clayton Valley 7

2004 Late

DLS 35 Pittsburg 6

 

2005 Early 

DLS shut out (only one of Lad's career) in 1st game by an 8-4 Central Valley team and outscores similarly rated opponents 124-14 in NCS 

Trend is still there unless, like Biden on the border, inflation, crime, etc, you just want to stick your head in the sand.