“The fact is, this is the biggest game I’ve ever coached,” head coach Kurt Hines says to the Coronado High football team in the crowded locker room. The players huddle around him, locked in on every word.
“…This is the biggest game you’ve played in, no matter what you’ve played in before, because what you’ve done in the past, doesn’t matter,” Hines continues, with extra stress on that last word.
“The past doesn’t affect this year.”
He’s yelling at this point, his left arm stretched out in front of him for extra emphasis.
And the players are shifting their weight back and forth, nodding in agreement, poised in anticipation, ready to sprint through the blow-up tunnel waiting for them on the field.
“Go out there tonight, from the opening kick off to the final echo of the final whistle, and play the most violent, disciplined game you have ever played. Do you understand me?” Hines prompts.
“Yes Coach!” they respond.
“Who are we?”
“Islanders!”
“How do we hit?”
“Hard!”
“THIS. IS. OUR. HOUSE.”
The team’s energy was palpable as the Islander’s ran onto the field before a crowd that matched that intensity. On either side of the stadium kids in the front row leaned against the railing in their green attire — high school students on one side and younger kids on the other, pom-poms in hand.
Twenty-four green boxes sat facing the crowd of parents and fans, and on those boxes stood the cheerleading team.
“I feel like this game [we] really came in with the most energy in the beginning of a season that I’ve seen,” said senior cheerleader and captain Cailin Curran. “I’m really excited. It’s going to be a good season.”
The first half
The Islanders held the scoreboard to 0-0 for the entirety of the first quarter, protecting their home field from the Hilltop High School Lancers.
But with 11:02 left in the second quarter, Hilltop scored a touchdown and the kick was good to secure an extra point, knocking the score to 7-0.
Mason Vaquero, a senior wide receiver on Hilltop, scored the team’s second touchdown, but the kick was no good: 13-0.
It was around this point, with about 6 minutes left in the first half, that Coronado’s starting quarterback, R.J. Sanchez, walked off the field holding his left elbow. Sitting on a table, the medical team secured his arm in a sling.
Hines reported the following day that Sanchez fractured his elbow, and with the current diagnosis, he should be back to play for a Sept. 27 game against Mar Vista High School.
Senior Jaiden Sherman took over for Sanchez.
“Jaiden was kind of thrown into the fire without getting starting quarterback reps,” Hines said, referring to the practices leading up to the game. “I was really proud of his character and his effort.”
Hines said this week, leading up to the Aug. 30 game against Holy Trinity Catholic High School from Canada, Sherman and Spencer Reidarson will split reps 50/50 at QB. Reidarson split time at the quarterback position for the remainder of the Aug. 23 game.
The second half
The Islanders, behind on the scoreboard and down a starting quarterback at half time, headed into the locker room to regroup while the fans and cheerleaders rallied in support.
After the cheerleaders performed their halftime routine, Casey Popp, the coach of the cheerleading team, noted that community involvement is his favorite part about sideline cheer.
“I’ve coached in this city (San Diego) for 30 years, and when I first came to Coronado, I had always heard you know, ‘Oh it’s a community-based program,’” Popp said. “It really is though. It’s different here… Everybody is very proud of their island.”
The tunnel was blown back up, and the team ran out onto the field to take on the second half as the student section performed a wave.
Whatever the coaches said at halftime seemed to work: With about 8:20 left in the third quarter, Sherman rumbled into the end zone to put 6 points on the scoreboard for the Islanders. This was one play after he tweaked his knee and chose to stay on the field. Senior Landon Sutherland kicked the extra point: 13-7.
But Hilltop answered quickly with a touchdown and an extra point, plus a safety: 22-7
With 4:16 left in the game, Sutherland had a 39-yard interception return for a touchdown and then followed up by kicking his own extra point.
At the final whistle, the Lancers had Coronado beat by 22-14.
“Hilltop was a good football team, well coached, well disciplined, and this part I hate, but they showed better character and class than we did, and that is the single most thing that bothered me last night, that bothers me now, the single most thing we’re working on in the future,” Hines said the following day.
While Hines noted areas of improvement — fewer turnovers, interceptions and missed routes — he faulted the team for issues of character, such talking back to officials and not giving 100% effort.
Hines praised the stand-out performances, both in character and game play, from senior captains Cable Fledderjohn and Walter Hardy, calling Fledderjohn a “beast on both sides of the ball” and Hardy “rock solid.”
Fledderjohn said as a captain, he tried to calm players who got upset at the refs. You have to forget about the last play and move on, he said.
“We had a lot of bad technique things which we’ll coach up and get better on,” Hines said. “All stuff that you hate to see, but stuff that I’d rather have happened on week one than when we’re making a playoff run.”
Remnants of Hines’ words from the pre-game huddle seemingly echo in his post-game recap, as they did in the words of two of the captains.
The past isn’t going to affect this year.
“We have a really strong team,” Hardy said. “Last year we had a really young team. We have a lot of people to fill the shoes of people who were here. So, I’m really excited for this season…We just need to play the next play, just keep focusing on what’s coming up next, not what already happened.”
