The First Football Game of the New Season

If you've been reading this site for long you probably know that I'm a fan of Mission Viejo High School football, and of course the Marching Band in which both of my kids play. Friday night was the season's first football game and the first attempt at the competition show the band will perform this year. Here they are on the field:

The band has only been working together for about 2 weeks, so they only performed about a minute of what will eventually become a 7 1/2 minute competition show. It's always quite a performance and by the time the State finals roll around in November, they'll be a well oiled machine.

The football team is once again ranked number one in Orange County (and probably #1 or 2 in the state), but I must admit the first half of their game against Chino Hills caused me some worries. You could tell there were some first game jitters and the players seemed tentative - missed tackles, broken plays, and some penalties that just shouldn't have happened.

The team did have a terrific defensive stand near the end of the first half when Chino Hills had a first-and-goal from the three and the Diablos kept them out of the end zone on four straight plays.

I had to leave at halftime with the team leading 16-7, but apparently the offense and defense woke up in the second half and the team ended up winning 44-7. Whew! I feel better now.

In two weeks we play the 2nd ranked team in Orange County, powerhouse Mater Dei, so there's still some work to do. It's a good start to the new season.