Pleasanton Preps: NCS needs to use some logic when it comes to De La Salle football

Well, another North Coast Section football championship has come and gone, and it’s another where De La Salle cruised to a title.

How many section championships in a row? The De La Salle streak of NCS titles is now at 28.

That’s right — 28 straight years that no team entered in the same division as De La Salle has had a chance to win the title.

And it’s not close. This year, the Spartans outscored their three playoff opponents 167-34 after beating Pittsburg 49-7 in the finals. Last year, it was two games and the final margin was 80-7, the year before two games with a total margin of 70-7. In 2015 was three games and a 152-14 gap, and in 2014 the margin was 145-33 over three games.

Over the last five years that’s a 614-95 total over 13 games, or a 47-7 average score in NCS play.

Each season it’s the goal for high school football teams to try to make the NCS playoffs. As each team enters the postseason, there’s the hope of advancing in the playoffs, and if your team catches lightning in a bottle, perhaps winning an NCS title.

It’s what makes high school football great — the chance to win an NCS title. Then again, that is unless you are in the same division as De La Salle. Imagine you work your way through the season and earn that spot in the playoffs only to be in the same division as the Spartans.

Flat out that stinks.

I have a tremendous amount of respect for De La Salle and all the Spartans have accomplished. It’s not the team’s fault for the lopsided nature of all the games, as they can only play who is put on the field across from them.

If you look at the big picture, the success of De La Salle makes football in Northern California look stronger. When the Spartans win a state title, the East Bay Athletic League gets credit as well.

But in the end, it’s not a level playing field — and that makes it wrong in my eyes. So, what needs to be done to level the playing field?

NCS needs to learn from the example of the EBAL. De La Salle is part of the EBAL but is not eligible to win an EBAL banner. Their players are eligible for all-EBAL honors, which seems fair to me, as well.

NCS should bring back the “Open division” and put the Spartans into the classification. The difference this time is not to force any other teams into the “Open” tournament.

If no one else enters, De La Salle still gets their NCS title and the top seed for NorCal playoffs in the Open division and ultimately the berth in the Open state final.

Face it, kids don’t play for De La Salle to win section titles in football, but rather state titles and possible national titles.

What would be left is every other playoff team in NCS can chase the dream of winning an NCS title. It seems like a solution where everyone wins, and at the end of the day, shouldn’t that be the goal when it comes to high school sports?

Somehow logic seems to escape at times when it comes to prep sports, but we can always hope!

Amador cross-country

This year’s Amador Valley boys cross-country team is officially the fastest in school history, as they reset every team and individual course record.

At the State Championships on Nov. 30, three Amador boys broke the school’s Woodward Park 5K course record of 15:40 that was set by Chris Maier in 1993.

Aidan McCarthy (15:25), Jack Gray (15:34) and Euan Houston (15:39) were the three runners that got it done. The combined team time, which also included John Lester, Jacob Lawrence, Mason Romant and Ryken Mak, set a new school time record of 79:27.

This fast time propelled the team to its first-ever Top 10 finish at the State Championships by finishing eighth.

Amador’s girls team also had a successful day competing in its second straight Division I State Championship.

Despite battling through injuries, they came within one second of matching last year’s school-best time of 95:58, resulting in a solid 13th-place finish. The team, as listed in order of their finish, consisted of Hope Bergmark, Ella McCarthy, Derica Su, Taya Small, Lois Hong, Erica Haley and Dahlia Versteeg.

Editor’s note: Dennis Miller is a contributing sports writer for the Pleasanton Weekly. To contact Miller or submit local high school sports scores, game highlights and photographs for his weekly Pleasanton Preps column, email him at acesmag@aol.com.

Editor’s note: Dennis Miller is a contributing sports writer for the Pleasanton Weekly. To contact Miller or submit local high school sports scores, game highlights and photographs for his weekly Pleasanton Preps column, email him at acesmag@aol.com.