Edison at Stagg: Part 1

This is my second year covering high school football in San Joaquin County and I’ve started to get comfortable with the personality of the area. I grew up in a small town in northern California and went to Corning Union High School in the Northern Section so I was unfamiliar with the rivalries and history around here.

Now that I’m getting comfortable with the schools around here, I have a better idea of what to expect from week to week. It’s helped me choose which games to shoot each Friday. This week I’ll be covering the Tri-City Athletic League game between Edison High and Stagg High. I’ve already shot two Edison games this year, their last-minute loss to Franklin High and their controversial win against West High. I haven’t had a chance to cover Stagg yet this year so I’m looking forward to seeing just how good they are. Today I’ll blog about Edison and analyze their season so far and take a look at their playoff chances. Stephen Roberson will blog about Stagg later and give some of his thoughts about the team and their season.

The Vikings are an intriguing team. They opened the season on the road with a 27-0 loss at Grant High – the open division bowl winners last year and CalHiSports.com’s No. 2 ranked team in the state. Grant has outscored teams 363-7 through eight games. There’s no shame in that loss, if anything, that game was impressive as Grant is looking unstoppable now.

The Vikings then went on the road to lose a close game to Lincoln (6-2), a team with losses to undefeated Tracy and St. Mary’s teams, and will finish the season at 8-2 unless a major upset happens. Then, the next week, Franklin High upset Edison with a crazy, fluky, last-minute victory for the second year in a row. After starting out 0-3, with three tough, closer than expected losses, it was obvious this team was going to rebound with some wins, especially with the next three games against Beyer, Chavez and McNair.

They took care of those three teams and then came the West game. I realize a lot of people are upset about the last play and rightfully so, but I don’t think forfeiting the game would have made sense. The game was about as close as you could get and the final drive had a series of cloudy calls. First, there was a play where the West runner was tackled in-bounds short of a first down and the Edison timekeeper stopped the clock for several seconds when it should have kept rolling. Then on the final play, the West ball carrier was struggling for yards before being tackled for a first down with 3 seconds left and West spiked the ball with 1 second left to set up the field goal. An Edison fan wrote me to complain that the player was still fighting for yards when the clock ran out – I thought the official blew the whistle before time ran out, but some people disagree. Edison forfeiting the game wouldn’t make sense because even if the official had made the correct call on the field goal, the Vikings could argue that those extra five or six seconds would have meant West shouldn’t have been able to kick a field goal. At this point, there’s no fair way to determine a winner of this game. In my mind, it was a draw and both teams played well and the final outcome was taken out of the hands of the players on the field.

On a 4-game win streak, Edison went on the road to play a 6-1 Tokay team and won 20-7. Tokay is a good team but has played a very weak schedule. Tokay, a Division I team, beat Division VI Brookside Christian (6-2) and beat a very good Stagg (6-2) team. Tokay’s other loss came to a tough Lodi (3-5) team when they went for a 2-point conversion instead of kicking a field goal to tie with less than a minute left, losing 14-13.

Edison’s season comes down to the Stagg game on Friday because it’s safe to assume they won’t be able to beat St. Mary’s in their last game. A win against Stagg would guarantee a playoff spot for the Vikings as they would clinch second place in TCAL at 6-4 overall and 4-1 in league play.

Hypothetically, if they lose to Stagg, Edison would still have a chance at the playoffs based on having three wins in league – two wins qualifies a team – and a 5-5 record with losses to St. Mary’s, Grant, Lincoln and Stagg. There’s a good chance St. Mary’s and Grant will end the regular season undefeated and in this scenario, it is likely Lincoln and Stagg would both finish the season at 8-2. A 5-5 Edison team could earn an at-large playoff spot, but would have to play one of the top seeded teams and that would be difficult for this team to overcome.

Check back here for Stephen Roberson’s look at Stagg later this week and visit Recordnet.com Friday for our live scoreboard from area games. I will be posting video highlights of the game by 2 a.m. Saturday morning.