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WCAL Football 2018 - San Jose Merc All Bay Area Team

WCAL Football 2018 - St. Francis vs Valley Christian for Div II Open Championship

In the toughest division in CCS, Div II the 2 teams St. Francis & Valley Christain are as advertised with a hard fought game 14-7 at the 1/2 with St. Francis leading14-7. The 2 teams with the #1 & #2 defenses in CCS have surprisingly put up more points in the first 1/2 than the entire last game between the 2 teams ending in 7-3 St. Francis. The X-Factor so far is SF's Evan Williams who has torched VC's secondary repeatedly including against double coverage. As I stated in other posts there is no DB I've seen this season who can cover EW for SF. The teams know its coming, they make adjustments & there is Evan Williams running by DB's & SS's and catching passes behind the secondary. If the VC secondary continues to let EW run past coverage and get behind secondary then VC will lose & deserves to lose as such. I cannot say enough about SF's replacement #2 QB Daly who game to game continues to be right on target and show a great deal of poise. Unless VC can get a kick-start and show some offense in a big way they will lose the rubber match to SF tonite. VC has shown no evidence of any pass game and the current 1-3 yard run gains will not erase a 10-point deficit going into the 4th quarter - SF's D just too good.
 
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Wow - Wow -Double Wow! What a finish in double O/T! SF had every opportunity to win over & over again & yet turnovers, penalties and seemingly "lucky" plays by VC kept them in it until SF's kicker missed the final PAT. Incredible game and best in quite awhile.. Wow!
 
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[B]colhenrylives said:
Would it be unfair and premature to state that VC has replaced Bellarmine as the WCAL's gold standard in San Jose?
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Yes just a bit premature to anoint VC as the undisputed King of Silicon Valley at this point. There are a few reasons for my uncanny wisdom in concluding this fact. There is very little separating VC & SF at this point. SF had one loss to DLS coming in and VC had 2 losses, to Wilcox and to SF. The 2 teams split their 2 games against each other with SF taking the first game 7-3 with SF's ony TD coming off an early INT in VC's red zone, with the only other score being a VC field goal. Without the INT then VC wins the defensive slug fest by 3-0. In the 2nd game between the 2 teams VC wins in an unforeseen shoot out coming from behind helped by multiple SF turnovers and eventually winning. SF of all things misses a PAT after scoring first in the 2nd O/T. The final score being 31-30 for a single point victory.

Let's revisit this same game 1 year ago and it was Serra and SF in a rematch for the CCS championship with Serra barely hanging on for again a 31-30 win over the Lancers. So what are the odds 2 WCAL teams 2 years in a row would play for a CCS championship with a score of 31-30, with SF losing in both cases? Both Serra and SF as we know went on last season to win their NorCal regional games and then win their state bowl games to bring home respective state championships. Now we wait to see how both VC & SF compete in their 2 NorCal regional games in which both teams will go in as the underdog. VC gets to face an 11-1 Liberty team whose only loss was being crushed by DLS last week 42-7. Liberty is ranked #14 in state while VC is ranked #30. THe SF lancers have an equally daunting task of facing a very tough Del Oro squad who comes in at 12-1 with its only loss being a 40-0 shut-out at the hands of Folsom, the 2nd best team in NorCal. Foslom is ranked #16 in state while SF is #34.

I think these games will better determine who the gold standard is for the San Jose area teams [and yes I do know the Lancers reside in Mt. View]. Bellarmine has disappeared from sight while Mitty remains solidly in 3rd place of those 4 teams. Now who would win a rubber match game between VC & SF? While the first 2 games were both close & based upon the turnovers in both games I would give SF the slight edge IMO. SF goes to the regionals once again while VC returns after missing out last season. In 2016 an excellent VC team that went 13-2 made it to state losing to Madison of San Diego by 21-17. VC & SF once again have the chance of advancing to a state bowl game but first have to overcome 2 very tough opponents.
 
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Rmbr26 said:
Yes just a bit premature to anoint VC as the undisputed King of Silicon Valley at this point. There are a few reasons for my uncanny wisdom in concluding this fact. There is very little separating VC & SF at this point. SF had one loss to DLS coming in and VC had 2 losses, to Wilcox and to SF. The 2 teams split their 2 games against each other with SF taking the first game 7-3 with SF's ony TD coming off an early INT in VC's red zone, with the only other score being a VC field goal. Without the INT then VC wins the defensive slug fest by 3-0. In the 2nd game between the 2 teams VC wins in an unforeseen shoot out coming from behind helped by multiple SF turnovers and eventually winning. SF of all things misses a PAT after scoring first in the 2nd O/T. The final score being 31-30 for a single point victory.

Let's revisit this same game 1 year ago and it was Serra and SF in a rematch for the CCS championship with Serra barely hanging on for again a 31-30 win over the Lancers. So what are the odds 2 WCAL teams 2 years in a row would play for a CCS championship with a score of 31-30, with SF losing in both cases? Both Serra and SF as we know went on last season to win their NorCal regional games and then win their state bowl games to bring home respective state championships. Now we wait to see how both VC & SF compete in their 2 NorCal regional games in which both teams will go in as the underdog. VC gets to face an 11-1 Liberty team whose only loss was being crushed by DLS last week 42-7. Liberty is ranked #14 in state while VC is ranked #30. THe SF lancers have an equally daunting task of facing a very tough Del Oro squad who comes in at 12-1 with its only loss being a 40-0 shut-out at the hands of Folsom, the 2nd best team in NorCal. Foslom is ranked #16 in state while SF is #34.

I think these games will better determine who the gold standard is for the San Jose area teams [and yes I do know the Lancers reside in Mt. View]. Bellarmine has disappeared from sight while Mitty remains solidly in 3rd place of those 4 teams. Now who would win a rubber match game between VC & SF? While the first 2 games were both close & based upon the turnovers in both games I would give SF the slight edge IMO. SF goes to the regionals once again while VC returns after missing out last season. In 2016 an excellent VC team that went 13-2 made it to state losing to Madison of San Diego by 21-17. VC & SF once again have the chance of advancing to a state bowl game but first have to overcome 2 very tough opponents.
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Not Silicon Valley. San Jose.
 
colhenrylives said:
Once again, the WCAL does not have enough all-league football players. There are Riordan reserves (and their parents) who are not happy.
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Surprised there are no orange slices and participation ribbons to go along with the 2nd team and HM namings. Lol!
 
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:)
Rmbr26 said:
Newest WCAL Football Award to be instituted in 2019:

Most Valuable PAT Holder [may be given out to 2 players if there is a left footed kicker next season].
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Dammit beat me to the PAT holder award. Was just gonna post that :)
 
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What’s the difference in qualifications between Most Valuable Outside Linebacker, and Inside Linebacker of the Year, other than inside/outside? Is there also a Most Valuable Inside Linebacker and Outside Linebacker of the Year?
 
A quick perusal of the WCAL website indicates that 116 varsity football players made the overall all-league listing. Whew.
 
Rmbr26 said:
Does anyone at The Examiner know Serra is in San Mateo & not in SF??
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I'm just happy an SF newspaper devotes time to prep sports. There was a time the Chronicle, Examiner and long gone Progress included Preps in the Sports Section.
Ryan Gorcey and contributing writers do a very good job covering the SF Prep sports scene.
 
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I agree the article was good & glad they included Serra with the other SF schools.
 
http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-preps-...incoln-wins-11th-san-francisco-section-title/

To my knowledge every Sheppard/Williams-Sheppard has gone to SH. It is a legacy family. However the latest one, goes to Lincoln. Family/child has every right to pick wherever they want to go, but found it interesting the latest one is not at SH. I would not blame the family for going a different direction after the tragedy to last one a few years ago.
 
WCAL Football 2018 - VC vs Liberty & SF vs Del Oro in NorCal Regional Playoffs

SO as I posted previous both WCAL schools are predicted to be "sacrificial lambs" to NorCal powers Liberty & Del Oro.
So do the #1 & #2 teams of the WCAL stand any glimmer of a chance of competing in these games? Or will this be merely a scrimmage for Liberty & Del Oro before moving on to state?

Liberty is an interesting team to me for several reasons with a record of 11-1. In 10 of Liberty's wins the games were simply not competitive with Liberty crushing the opposing teams. The only 2 games in which Liberty struggled to any extent was the 24-21 win over Pitt and their last game being crushed themselves by the Green Machine DLS SPartans by 42-0. Its bewildering how Liberty could be so dominant over so many teams yet just another team that DLS smothered in every way possible. The same could be said of a good Pitt team who looked to be solid and competitive but was equally dominated by DLS by 38-0. The only WCAL teams to face both Pitt and DLS were Serra losing to Pitt by 45-35 and SF losing to the Spartans by 33-15. I'll throw out a hunch as to what I think may occur. The WCAL teams rely heavily on defense more so than other leagues teams and less so on the offensive side of the ball especially passing. I know what the score of the SF-DLS game was and am guessing that DLS would not have hung 38-42 to 0 on VC as they did on both Pitt & Liberty. What that translates to is that VC will hold down the scoring by Liberty in this game & the bigger question is how much VC can score vs Liberty. VC has a solid pass defense and is tough against the run as well and I do not see Liberty's RB's averaging 6-8 YPC as they have done against the majority of their opponents. On the opposite side of the ball can VC run against Liberty? Looking at the Serra vs Pitt game Pitt averaged over 6 YPC against Serra and won the game by 10 as the Padres D couldn't slow down Pitt's run game. Likewise Pitt had the same success vs Liberty, however Pitt does not possess a potent pass game. Valley Christian has a better rushing game than Serra and a better run D as well. I see this game as being very close as on paper it appears VC matches up well with Liberty.

I previously reviewed SF vs Del Oro briefly and Del Oro is the decided favorite, esp after the SF loss to VC though by only a single point. The 1-point loss though could make SF that much more dangerous an opponent to DO. Del Oro is traditionally a physical team though in this match-up will not intimidate the SF Lancers. SF is tough on both sides of the ball and it comes down to DO's pass game vs SF's secondary and the Lancer secondary is solid. One question mark will be SF's Maurice Wilmer a main-stay on both sides of the ball as DB & WR as suffered an injury the last game vs VC. If not available for the DO game Milmer will be sorely missed.
 
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Rmbr26 said:
WCAL Football 2018 - VC vs Liberty & SF vs Del Oro in NorCal Regional Playoffs

SO as I posted previous both WCAL schools are predicted to be "sacrificial lambs" to NorCal powers Liberty & Del Oro.
So do the #1 & #2 teams of the WCAL stand any glimmer of a chance of competing in these games? Or will this be merely a scrimmage for Liberty & Del Oro before moving on to state?

Liberty is an interesting team to me for several reasons with a record of 11-1. In 10 of Liberty's wins the games were simply not competitive with Liberty crushing the opposing teams. The only 2 games in which Liberty struggled to any extent was the 24-21 win over Pitt and their last game being crushed themselves by the Green Machine DLS SPartans by 42-0. Its bewildering how Liberty could be so dominant over so many teams yet just another team that DLS smothered in every way possible. The same could be said of a good Pitt team who looked to be solid and competitive but was equally dominated by DLS by 38-0. The only WCAL teams to face both Pitt and DLS were Serra losing to Pitt by 45-35 and SF losing to the Spartans by 33-15. I'll throw out a hunch as to what I think may occur. The WCAL teams rely heavily on defense more so than other leagues teams and less so on the offensive side of the ball especially passing. I know what the score of the SF-DLS game was and am guessing that DLS would not have hung 38-42 to 0 on VC as they did on both Pitt & Liberty. What that translates to is that VC will hold down the scoring by Liberty in this game & the bigger question is how much VC can score vs Liberty. VC has a solid pass defense and is tough against the run as well and I do not see Liberty's RB's averaging 6-8 YPC as they have done against the majority of their opponents. On the opposite side of the ball can VC run against Liberty? Looking at the Serra vs Pitt game Pitt averaged over 6 YPC against Serra and won the game by 10 as the Padres D couldn't slow down Pitt's run game. Likewise Pitt had the same success vs Liberty, however Pitt does not possess a potent pass game. Valley Christian has a better rushing game than Serra and a better run D as well. I see this game as being very close as on paper it appears VC matches up well with Liberty.

I previously reviewed SF vs Del Oro briefly and Del Oro is the decided favorite, esp after the SF loss to VC though by only a single point. The 1-point loss though could make SF that much more dangerous an opponent to DO. Del Oro is traditionally a physical team though in this match-up will not intimidate the SF Lancers. SF is tough on both sides of the ball and it comes down to DO's pass game vs SF's secondary and the Lancer secondary is solid. One question mark will be SF's Maurice Wilmer a main-stay on both sides of the ball as DB & WR as suffered an injury the last game vs VC. If not available for the DO game Milmer will be sorely missed.
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Great analysis as usual. I think the defenses of SF and VC will keep them in the game. It will be up to their offenses as to how the games turn out. I like SF’s chances a little more than VC, as their passing game is much better. Either way I don’t see any blow outs and both teams will represent the WCAL well.
 
I think both WCAL teams have a good chance to advance.

General question for each is how St Francis bounces back from tough loss and if VC can create big plays on offense
 
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iamgearyblvd said:
http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-preps-...incoln-wins-11th-san-francisco-section-title/

To my knowledge every Sheppard/Williams-Sheppard has gone to SH. It is a legacy family. However the latest one, goes to Lincoln. Family/child has every right to pick wherever they want to go, but found it interesting the latest one is not at SH. I would not blame the family for going a different direction after the tragedy to last one a few years ago.
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I believe he was actually at SI his freshman year.
 
[B]Streak One[/B] said:
I think both WCAL teams have a good chance to advance.
General question for each is how St Francis bounces back from tough loss and if VC can create big plays on offense
Click to expand...

I would agree that neither game will feature any kind of blow-out/running clock. While SF & VC do not appear to have explosive offenses they are both capable of putting up points against most opponents. I was looking at DLS and what teams have scored against the Spartans extremely tough D. St. Francis lost by 33-15 to DLS and in other games vs DLS the Folsom team scored 0, Liberty scored 7, Pitt scored 0 and Central Catholic scored 7. So in comparison yes SF can score along with VC.

The most interesting aspect for me in both games will be how DO & liberty can move the ball against SF & VC's defense. While the WCAL has always been defense oriented these 2 teams VC & SF both have a superb D. Both have a number of studs on D, are hard to run against and both teams have excellent secondaries - among the best I've seen in WCAL in recent years'. Look for both games to be on the low scoring side with the difference being possibly 1 score.
 
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WCAL Football 2018 - NorCal Regionals: VC -Liberty first up 6PM & then SF-Del Oro at 7:30

Both games on NFHSnetwork along with the M-A vs Eureka game at 7:30 and also Wilcox vs Captial Christian.

How will the CCS fare tonite in the 4 NorCal regional games? Everyone and their uncle has said this season the "CCS is way down" along with "the WCAL is noticeably down this season". Curious if these "experts" are correct?
Will WCAL represent well? Will M-A and Wilcox live up to their hype & can WIlcox rebound from their terrible bread-down and O/T loss to M-A last week? [or will confidence be an issue?
4 good games and 4 good teams from CCS!
 
VC-Liberty is tomorrow night at 6pm along with Capital Christian @ Wilcox (Both games are A division regionals, not AA)
 
[B said:
"user11235[/B], post: 220158, member: 8279"]VC-Liberty is tomorrow night at 6pm along with Capital Christian @ Wilcox (Both games are A division regionals, not AA)
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Thanks - I jumped the gun on that so to speak [rushing home from work for 6 PM, guess now I can relax til 7:30 SF-DO..]
 
WCAL Football 2018 - St. Francis goes down to Del Oro by 14-13

Traveling today so first chance to recap the disappointing loss last night in Del Oro.

Well St. Francis having every opportunity to win found a way to lose last nite to Del Oro. The Lancer's stopped short of the end zone 3 times made 2 field goals while bouncing the 3rd off the upright to lead 6-0 at the 1/2. Both teams scored a TD in 3rd to make score 13-7 SF as the Lancer's were their own worst enemy making more mistakes as the game wore on. Into the 4th and SF up 13-7 and only had to maintain ball control and not make any major mistakes, both of which they were unable to do. Del Oro to their credit scored a late TD to go up by one 14-13. With a few minutes left the Lancers were marching down field, when SF's QB Daly under pressure threw a floater up for grabs in the middle of the field in Del Oro's red zone. Result = INT & game over and that was pretty much it.

SO an entertaining game, but had to be extremely frustrating for SF fans as SF did dominate much of this game.
The difference was the DO team knows how to find a way to win and close it out. SF while an excellent team could not close out VC the week prior and faded in the 2nd 1/2 vs Del Oro. SF won 3 quarters of this game while Golden Eagles won the last and most important quarter.
 
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Good season, WCAL. Thanks Rmber26 for another compelling mega-thread for the WCAL league.

Final observations: Our first view of WCAL still seems right. WCAL is a bit down this year. And the CCS, as a whole, seemed pretty down. Kudos to the DAAL and PAL-Bay leagues for their good seasons. Glad to see Wilcox and MA heading to a SBG game to represent the CCS and NorCal.
 
Yes Kudos well deserved for both M-A & Wilcox in representing the CCS well in NorCal regionals with wins to head to state bowl games. Both SF & VC played well and were competitive against Del Oro and Liberty, whom I might add were both the favored teams going into those contests. I felt both contests could have gone either way except for mental mistakes and penalties which are all part of the game. Not much separated SF & VC this season and they were clearly at a level above all other teams of the WCAL.
 
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