Demons showing signs of life
Jaguars’ Moon thinks S.F. coach Martinez and staff will quickly end losing ways
If you’re improving, take the yardage. Inch by inch, yard by yard. That’s exactly what the Santa Fe High football team is doing this season under new head coach Andrew Martinez. The proof is in the numbers. Aside from the fact that the roster is bigger and the attitude has changed since two-a-days commenced, the Demons are heading into Friday’s latest City Different rivalry game with a full head of steam. Their 21 points in last
week’s loss to Santa Teresa represented their highest output in nearly a calendar year and their second-highest since the middle of the 2014 season when their 26-game losing streak began.
Santa Fe High (0-2) heads to Capital (0-2) for their 25th meeting with the Jaguars on Friday night.
It’s a reunion, of sorts, for the head coaches. Martinez was an all-district guard on Bill Moon’s Capital team in 1989, and the two have remained close over the years.
Before Martinez was officially hired in the offseason, Moon was asked by Santa Fe High Vice Principal Mark Mutz — who scored Capital’s first touchdown in that initial meeting with the Demons a quarter century ago — to address the returning players.
“It was really just a pep talk, essentially an opportunity for me to tell their guys to keep their heads up and keep working hard,” Moon said.
Martinez was announced as the head
coach not long after. Slowly but surely he has worked to change the climate of Demons football, one Moon can see from his perch on the south side of town.
“There are two key elements at Santa Fe High that will guarantee a coach will have the opportunity to succeed,” Moon said. “The first is a great [athletic director] and the second is a great principal. Name me the best NFL team out there and I’ll point to a great [general manager] and a great owner. … The worst has a terrible front office and a worthless owner.”
Martinez is certainly part of that dynamic. A no-nonsense type who spent years crafting his trade as an assistant at St. Michael’s, he inherited a team that got its first infusion of confidence last week. The Demons offense scored twice, its special teams unit returned a kickoff for a touchdown and the defense recorded a safety.
More importantly, the team never quit. Down three touchdowns in the final minute, the offense got the ball and scored in the waning moments when quarterback Levi Lopez threaded a sideline pass on a rollout right for a late touchdown.
As his team headed off the field, Martinez spoke about the turning of the tide at the city’s flagship school. It all begins with the mental approach of his players, something he already sees as a positive.
“They fought for four quarters,” he said. “I thought it was a big jump [from Week 1] and it’s just going to be a process that way. As long we keep chugging along, as long as we take care of the penalties and turnovers, make sure we have the right personnel and we’re paying attention, make sure we’re doing our work in the film room, we’re going to be on track here soon.”
Zach Russell scored two of Santa Fe’s touchdowns, the first of which came on the kick return that provided the jolt the Demons needed.
“What people don’t understand with a new [coaching] staff is it takes so much to gather the players up and learn a new system,” Moon said. “What kills you in football games is mistakes. So many can be attributed to things breaking down due to something as simple as vocabulary. The players’ part of learning a new system is the terminology the coaches assign and once they get that down there’s no telling how high you can go.”
Three former Capital players dot Santa Fe High’s coaching staff, a group that Moon thinks will need just a year or two to get the Demons out of their funk and back to an identity closer resembling the team that won back-toback district championships just four years ago.
“The only thing those players can do is look at the game in front of them, not the 26 behind them,” Moon said. “The sooner they block out what everyone else is saying, the better they’re going to be. That’s not always easy for a teenager, believe me, but it is possible. It’s just a matter of time with them because they’re Santa Fe kids and Santa Fe kids are just fine in my book.”
NOTES
Inspirational award: Alejandro Rivas is a sophomore on Capital’s C-team roster.
He also has one arm after losing the other in a car accident. The arm he has left was broken in a recent game.
Moon said Rivas is the kind of player that can — and should — inspire everyone around him to attack life with a smile.
“In 32 years of coaching, I’ve never had a kid break his arm during a game, and this young man had a displaced radial fracture,” Moon said. “He was in the hospital that morning when he shows up to practice, walks up to me with his arm in a sling and asks me for my keys.”
Rivas wanted to take his uniform home and wash it.
“He was smiling the entire time,” Moon said. “The kid has been through more than we can imagine and here he is smiling and enjoying it. He’s laughing. If that doesn’t make you feel better about what kind of young man he is, I’m not sure what will.”
There is no timetable for Rivas’ return, but does it matter? He seems to have already won.