While De La Salle was winning 151 consecutive games and six National Prep Poll titles during the 1990s and early 2000s, some were scoffing.
They argued the Spartans would never have stayed unbeaten so long if subjected to a state playoff system like teams in Texas, Florida or Ohio are.
And some DLS critics are already using the Spartans' loss to SoCal representative Canyon in the first-ever Division I state championship bowl as fuel to rekindle their fire of skepticism about "The Streak."
I say hogwash.
First of all, the De La Salle teams that went undefeated and won National Prep Poll titles were often tested by the state's best. The Spartans collected four wins over Mater Dei and two over Long Beach Poly from 1998-2002.
Secondly, the De La Salle team that lost Saturday night probably couldn't have stayed on the field with of any of the great Spartans teams of the past.
Just my opinion here ... but this year's version of De La Salle was exceptionally solid, but it was not spectacularly great. There were no Maurice Drews, Terrance Kellys, Amani Toomers or D.J. Williams making plays. It's very likely that this year's De La Salle squad was without a future starter at the Pac-10 level, let alone the NFL.
And as we all know, great players make great plays. And great playmaking is essential for a team to achieve greatness.
Think about Maurice Drew's fabulous ballcarrying in the great DLS wins over Long Beach Poly.
How about all the amazing plays Chris Rainey made to lead Lakeland to three consecutive 5A championships.
Or Chase Daniel flinging all those touchdown passes and running for all those scores to lead Southlake Carroll to glory.
Those sort of plays were what De La Salle needed -- but lacked -- on Saturday night.
1 comment:
No one can ever take away the 151 game win streak that DLS accomplis-
hed, though a more than fair amount of those games were against
far inferior teams located right here in the SF Bay Area. One should ask why doesn't DLS go and play a top 25 ranked team from either Texas or Florida? They fly to Hawaii, Washington (where they
got beat), and Ohio and play teams
that nobody has ever heard of! Or they have a team like that one from Louisana a few years ago fly out here and play them but again who ever heard of them too!! DLS is
definetly in a class of their own, but there IS one team here in NorCAl theat went 13-0, Grant HS of
Sacaramento. I understand they have been trying to schedule a game
with DLS since 1992 but DLS keeps refusing! This years Grant of SAc team is so loaded that if there ever was a NorCAl play-off between
NorCal HS football teams than it most likely would have been Grant
not Canyon beating DLS! Then Grant
would have gone on to play Canyon for the state title. As for this years DLS team, defeinetly not even
as close as thier past championship
teams, As Canyon used a 4-4 defense
to shut down DLS's vaunted veer option, and played man-to-man on thier recievers knowing that the DLS QB didn't have the deep arm. This was a masterpiece of a defens-
ive game, bend but don't break, and
always 4,5, and sometimes 6 players flying to the ball! My hat is off to Canyon. And DLS? One cannot fall back on thier past track record when you replace players that aren't the same caliber as the one's you lost! DLS
will be back again beating up on all of the sub-par HS Football teams here in the SF Bay Area, but
now with our new technology I'm sure there are more than a couple of teams ordering DVD's to see how
Canyon beat DLS!
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