By Tim Peterson
Ten years ago West Covina dropped 84 points on La Serna in the CIF Southeast Division championship game. 84! Just smashed the Lancers. Obliterated them. Yet when interviewed after the game then La Serna head coach Margarito Beltran said in part “They took it to us. There’s not much else to say. They did a heck of a job preparing, and they beat us. Plain and simple.”
No anger, no whining no complaining. Just that he knew that he got beat by a better team and wasn’t able to stop them. Last Friday night Inglewood beat Morningside 106-0 in the final regular season game of the year. And there has been an outrage. Is it justified? Absolutely! Where do I start?
West Covina threw the ball three times in the game. They were running off tackle the entire night. Inglewood quarterback Justyn Martin, a UCLA commit, threw 13 touchdown passes in the game. He was still throwing up 90 and never stopped.
West Covina did all of that with its twos and threes as head coach Mike Maggiore went to his bench. Inglewood HC Mil’Von James declined to play his back ups despite being up 59-0 after the first quarter. His starters played until the bitter end.
In the West Covina game Beltran initially refused a running clock in the third quarter but it was running the entire fourth. James was reticent to use a running clock before it was finally mandatory.
And maybe the last nail in the coffin was Inglewood going for two after scoring the touchdown that made it 104-0 for the final points of the game. Going for two? Up 104? What point or points was James possibly trying to make?
Maggiore’s reputation precedes him. He is arguably one of the most, if not the most, respected head coaches in the area. He has always respected his opponent. He always does things the right way – with class and dignity – as he did in the 84-21 victory. He emptied his bench, he ran the ball, he coached the game and had his players play the game the way it’s supposed to be played.
James’ reputation, unfortunately, precedes him as well. He was fired from another Los Angeles area school, Hawkins, after the school had to forfeit all of its games in 2016 as a result of rules violations that included the use of multiple ineligible players. The school was also placed on a two-year probationary period by the CIF City Section.
CIF condemned Inglewood for this game for lack of sportsmanship and even Inglewood High School issued a written apology for its actions in the game. James. of course, never responded to e mails from reporters inquiring about the situation.
Given his history one would wonder why Inglewood hired James in the first place.
You wonder what was going through James’ mind as the score continued to climb. His worst nightmare would have been realized if a Morningside lineman took exception to Martin still dropping back to pass up 92-0 and delivered a hit to the quarterback that caused serious injury. Bye bye scholarship. That would have been all on James. Thank God it didn’t happen because it wasn’t Martin’s fault. It was on James. This whole thing is on James.
I’m all for the statement “If you don’t want them to run it up then stop them”. But this goes beyond that. Morningside couldn’t stop them. That was clear. Yet Mil’Von James never pulled his starters, continued to throw the ball and went for two up 104. Nothing good can come of that.
At some point Karma will catch up with James. If there are “Football Gods” they will take action at some point…at some time. You can count on that. 106 percent!
That’s my principle.
Tim can be reached at tim.midvalleysports@gmail.com or on Twitter @tspeterson40. Facebook-Tim Peterson.
It’s wrong when you are coaching kids in youth sports and embarrassing your opponent. This isn’t professional athletes, there are kids are Morningside with little to no experience before this year that are 15/16 year olds that deserve better from the adults in charge on both sides.
Great take Tim. Simply no excuse for what took place in that game.
nothing that Inglewood did was wrong there’s rule in the rule book that says you can’t play your starters the whole game or can’t score if morningside didn’t like stop it or refuse to play the second because the game was out of hand in the first half. As far as Sportsmanship not sure what they did wrong Inglewood played there game it wasn’t dirty, they couldn’t be stopped that’s on morningside
@tim Don’t understand people being upset with the score because the number one players were still playing but are fine with West Covina running up the score with number two and three players does it make a difference your still getting your DELETED handle to you. As far as the running clock it should be left to the officials decision to have it run or not or have a rule that if your down by 35 or more the clock automatically stays running. And people are going to be surprised by Inglewood on Friday not sure if they have enough to win the game but they have 3 UCLA commits along with a few more d-1 commits, the team is not just a bunch of nobody’s they have talent not sure they have the depth to keep up on Friday. Milvon James gets a bad reputation because he recruits players which nowadays every good program does but you can’t deny he knows how to win and build a program that Hawkins program before he got fired had top D-1 coaches going to the hood to recruit players which is rare to see.
Has everyone become a St Bonnaventure fan this week?
The Morningside High School principal was in the EMUHSD and let go, then at Bassett and got fire from there. Second, he was hired at Venice High and got fired. Finally, he is at Morningside High School and losing big follows him where ever he goes. What is his name? That guy must know how to interview, but if you can’t work and don’t know what he is doing it will catch up with him again. I am sure he will get fired from Morningside High School also.
That is not why he got tossed from Hawkins. He got tossed because he told reports he didnt care for play-offs or anything the city section had to say about who can play at his school. He was their to get kids out it is plan and simple as that. He went on to say he will continue to play kids not cleared or ineligible players.
Tim, look up high school football AAA city champions of Wilson L.A. 76’ 77’ 78’ 79’. Vic Cuccia along with his son Ron ran up scores on opponents and were getting slammed for that back then. They made a team Lincoln quit at halftime at 63-0. Game was over. They were on to score a 100 or better that day. They were on side kicking the whole half up by 40 at that time. It happens. Do you quit or continue is up to the opposing coach who is taking the beat down. Lincoln refused to let them get their records and walked.
Let’s see how Inglewood does now with the big boys. I don’t see them winning.
I hope they get their you know what whoop this Friday against st. Bonaventure
I cant believe some of these responses with the “what about isms” I’ve watched Arroyo in a blowout, and I’ve watched Montebello beat Keppel, none of those programs ever had their starting team in there beyond the 3rd quarter and they surely were not throwing the ball. Let me guess you’re ok with stomping on someone’s head when they are already knocked out. The lack of integrity I’ve seen from people lately is incredible.
All I know is a team many hype on these very pages was leading a game by over 40 points with a few minutes to go with a running clock as most of their games were this year. The game was over..So as a coach what do you do, Sure you put in the end of the bench and let them play and you run the ball and let the clock go. If you score so be it.
But in this case they throw a 30 plus yard pass and score on a 60+ yd play. Well that blows, and the lead is 50 points.. Then you get the ball back with almost no time.
And here is the kicker, the kids on the bench are yelling they can set a scoring record. as they drive for another score. My reaction was that was a hell of way to teach sportsmanship. Thankfully the drive died near the goal line and a knee was taken on the last play.
It was not 106 to nothing with a 59-0 lead at the end of the 1st quarter like Inglewood but telling your kids ( a lie) you can set a scoring record with another pile on score in an out of hand game is the sort of thing CIF is investigating with the Inglewood victory.
John Wooden,
Sports do not build character, they reveal it.
I know there are many coaches who do not take the foot off the pedal, and the ranking system encourages one to pile on the score.. If CIF really wants to change things they should look at the ranking system, first. And second you should talk to any coach whose players are yelling for a score at the last seconds to “set a scoring record”
Tim we have to call it fair Inglewood program was a bad before James showed up, he has rebuilt and they have a couple of D-1 recruits on there team. As far as what happened at Hawkins they had kids transfer in and LAUSD took exception to it but at the same time it was allowing Narbonne to have out of state guys transfer to there school. But again he had the program on the up and up at Hawkins. Lastly were is cif when these leagues are created they don’t have competitive balance, and then went to come out and talk about sportsmanship when this type of thing happens. Have the SGV look at what arroyo does to its league, what the almont teams do to keppel, there’s more examples but these leagues should be more balanced
Thats not what I remember in the game. It was probably near the end of the 3rd qtr when 1st stringers were still in the game up by 50+ pts for WC. Thats what happens when you have several D1 athletes that can play. I guess you can’t be certain of the outcome with a 56 point lead in the 3rd! This Coach seems to want the Glory or something. I’m as competive as it gets. But at some point he needed to shut it down and win with Class! He definitely needs a talking to!
@peterson for one West Covina was a running team, Inglewood is spread/air raid team, second have you had the opportunity to meet James or go to Inglewood and see the dumpster fire it was before James arrived, if the biggest problem is running up the score I think they would take it, Third the James brothers have a bad rap like matt V for recruiting players back to the hood from the big boy high school teams. Forth the Hawkins situation was interesting in that they caused a lot animosity and jealousy with all the d-1coaches coming to campus and being a newer school, but again most of the kids were in the program or Will coming back to there home school.
From T. Peterson: West Covina was a running team, that’s correct. But they were running and scoring with their twos and threes. Also they’re not going to throw the ball there. That’s not a good look. I don’t mind James getting Inglewood better. I have a problem with him running up the score on a clearly inferior opponent. As far as the Hawkins situation bottom line is CIF still ruled that they had to forfeit all of their games due to ineligible players. Inglewood is air raid, ok. So if that really is the only offense they know (which I don’t buy) why not run it with the back up quarterback? Get him some work. No reason at all for Martin to be in there. Still no explanation as to why they went for two. No defending that.
I’m glad that I did not have to cover that game.
Playing ineligible players, as well as showing the lack of class that he demonstrated last Friday, should be enough to earn “Coach” James a lifetime ban. He has no business working with kids…of any age.
While we’re at it, let’s get rid of the Inglewood Principal…he could have stopped this fiasco. I also blame the officials. Someone should have stepped in.
Again, I’m glad that I wasn’t in attendance.
If I remember correctly West Covina could’ve truly ran it up and would’ve had reason to since La Serna refused to play at a bigger venue, Cal high at that time was not suitable to host a cif championship game. Maggiore’s bench just went off. They were on another level that year.
Toughest Peterson take in 20 years.