Prep rarity: Donning helmets of two colors
NFL teams are prohibited by safety protocols from using alternate helmets to fit different uniform combinations. College programs aren’t. Neither are high school teams, although it’s rare to see prep clubs get the funding to pull it off.
A typical helmet can cost $200 or more, making it more of a pipe dream than reality to go with a different look every week — something the University of New Mexico does with its anthracite and white helmet combo. And Oregon does basically every week thanks to its ties with Nike.
The exception locally is West Las Vegas, which now has matte black domes to go with the matte white the Dons had on opening day. The Dons wore the black helmets this past weekend in a victory over St. Michael’s.
The 27-0 goose egg Albuquerque St. Pius X delivered to Taos in Saturday’s prep football game at Milne Stadium was the first shutout loss by the Tigers in nearly three calendar years. The last time they were kept off the scoreboard was in a 25-0 loss at Las Vegas Robertson on Oct. 30, 2015.
That also happened to be head coach Art Abreu Jr.’s first season with the program. Now in his fourth year, he’s on the verge of a rarity in high school football: Being part of five straight seasons in
which a team has increased its win total each year.
The Tigers won four games the year before Abreu took over, then have gone 5-6, 6-5 and 8-4. They’re 7-1 after Saturday’s loss and are considered the favorite in their final two games of the regular season — this week at home against Pojoaque Valley and the finale on Nov. 2 at Bernalillo.
It took 16 years, but Monte del Sol’s boys soccer program is on the cusp of its first piece of hardware. With a win over Desert Academy on Tuesday, the Dragons will secure their first district title and could be in line for the top seed for the Class 1A/3A State Tournament. That shouldn’t come as a surprise, though, because Monte del Sol has been one of the top smallschool programs for the past decade.
Until missing last year’s postseason bracket, the Dragons reached the state tournament six consecutive years. Their 2013 squad advanced to the 1A/3A semifinals, which also happened to be the highest seed they acquired (No. 4).
The primary challenger to Monte del Sol’s claim for a top seed is 2-1A/3A leader St. Michael’s, which is a win over Albuquerque Sandia Prep away from winning its first district title in five years. The teams played on Sept. 7 and the game ended 1-1.
It could make for an intriguing decision for the New Mexico Activities Association, which seeds and selects teams for the state tournament: The Horsemen or the Dragons?
Speaking of the soccer postseason hopes, both the Santa Fe High and Capital boys teams suffered stunning losses on Saturday. Albuquerque Manzano beat the Demons 3-2 in overtime, while Albuquerque Sandia handled the Jaguars 4-2.
The Demons and the Jaguars had the best chances among the District 5-5A teams, as they both are tied for second place at 4-4. However, they are ranked 13th and 14th in the latest MaxPreps. com Freeman rankings, which the NMAA uses to help select and seed teams for the state tournament.
One of them will see their postseason dreams extinguished on Wednesday, as the two teams play each other at Santa Fe High at 6 p.m.
The North lost a tennis stalwart on Wednesday when former Española Valley head tennis coach Wendall Barnett passed away at the age of 92. Barnett spent 30 years with the Sundevils boys program before retiring in 2016, usually battling the likes of Los Alamos, Albuquerque Academy and Taos for district supremacy.
It was often an uphill battle, but there were moments of pure joy. Barnett broke down in tears in 2005 when the doubles team of Henry Talachy and Frankie Rendon became the program’s first district champion under him, and his last two boys teams reached the Class 5A State Tournament in 2015 and 2016.
Barnett also was a part of a tennis coaching triumvirate of longevity that included former Los Alamos head girls coach Bruce Cottrell and Taos’ Kurt Edelbrock. When Barnett retired, the coaches combined for 81 years of experience (Cottrell retired at Los Alamos in 2017 but almost immediately became an assistant coach at Capital).
UNM head football coach Bob Davie has $350,000 in performance incentives built into his contract. There are 10 line items making up that figure, including various postseason awards and accomplishments.
If you answered $220,000, you win the prize. If your second answer was $350,000, you are well on your way to some serious bragging rights.
Conservative thinking shows he has already lost out on $220,000 because, at 3-4 overall and 1-2 in the Mountain West, it’s safe to say he will not lead the Lobos to a BCS bowl bid ($150,000), win the national coach of the year award ($25,000) or be named the MWC’s top coach ($10,000).
It’s also a virtual given he will not get the Lobos into the top 25 before season’s end ($10,000), or have them finish in the national rankings (another $25,000).
Other incentives include $50,000 for winning the MWC title, $20,000 for an appearance in a non-BCS bowl and $10,000 for a win over a top 25 team, and all three could still happen.
Also on the table are two attendance bonuses that are, as of now, off the table. He gets $25,000 if the Lobos average 19,000 fans in six games (they are 1,092 below that after Saturday’s game against Fresno State) and another $25,000 if the final attendance is 21,000, meaning the team must average 24,092 over its final three games to reach that figure.
In other words, Davie might be out $350,000 before the holidays.