With the arrival of August comes the beginning of high school football practice and the release of schedules for games that begin in September.
Santa Monica High will open September 9 with a home game (Corsair Field) against West Torrance. It will be the beginning of Michael Burnett’s third season as the Vikings’ head coach.
Samohi will play at Palisades September 16, and there will be a game at Corsair Field too that evening, a non-league contest between Venice and Loyola.
The next week, September 23, Venice will play Samohi at Corsair Field and the next week, Sept. 30, Samohi will play St. Monica.
The two Santa Monica schools had never met in football until 2003. St. Monica won the first meeting, and Samohi won last season’s contest.
Although St. Monica Coach Jason Strouse isn’t sure if some of his best players will play football this season or concentrate on baseball year-round, he’s in favor of promoting the annual game with Santa Monica.
“I’d like to see banners on the downtown Santa Monica streets, members of the City Council in attendance and other promotions to make this game special,’’ he said. “This should be a big event in Santa Monica.’’
In October, Santa Monica will play a non-league game at Roosevelt on the 7th, then begin its five-game Ocean League schedule.
It will be Santa Monica at Inglewood on the 14th, then home against Morningside on the 21st and Culver City on the 28th. The league schedule concludes with a game at Beverly Hills November 4 and a game at Hawthorne November 11.
Last season, Santa Monica edged Culver City, 14-13, to set up a showdown with Hawthorne for the league championship. Hawthorne won a close game and all three teams qualified for the CIF playoffs.
St. Monica will open September 9 at Bishop Montgomery and will be home (St. Bernard High) the next week against El Segundo.
The Mariners’ November schedule begins on the 7th at Palisades and continues on the 14th against La Salle at St. Bernard, at Mary Star (Daniels Field) on the 21st and home (St. Bernard) against Malibu on the 28th.
On November 5, the opponent will be St. Anthony at St. Bernard and, on the 11th, St. Monica will be at Verbum Dei at 1 p.m.
Ray Humphrey, who has spent the last 12 years in various roles with Santa Monica High athletics, is the new head coach at Malibu High, which went 10-2 last season but suffered heavy graduation losses.
Malibu will play half of its schedule — five games — in the daytime.
The opener is Saturday, September 10, at Rio Hondo Prep at 2 p.m. The next Friday, September 16, Malibu will travel to Ribet Academy for a 3 p.m. game. In the season’s third week, the opponent will be Brethren Christian of Huntington Beach at Clark Field in Lakewood. Then on September 30 Malibu will play its first home game, meeting St. Genevieve at 7 p.m.
On October 7, Malibu will play at Brentwood at 7 p.m., then at Capistrano Valley Christian October 14, also at 7 and at Chadwick October 22 at 2 p.m.
In another meeting of Westside schools, Malibu will meet St. Monica (at St. Bernard High) October 28 at 7 p.m.
The Sharks’ regular season schedule will conclude November 4 at Santa Clara (2:30 p.m.) and at Villanova Prep November 11, also at 2:30.
Brentwood, coached by Patrick Brown, will open September 9 at Animo High of Inglewood (4 p.m.) and will go to Mojave September 16 at 7 p.m. before playing its home opener September 23 against Tri City Christian of Vista at 7 p.m.
On the following weekend, the contest will be on Saturday, October 1 at Lucerne Valley at 2 p.m.
It will be Brentwood at Malibu October 7 and at Pasadena Poly October 15 at 2 p.m., followed by a home game October 22 against Maranatha (2 p.m.) and another against Calvary Chapel Ocober 28 at 2:15 p.m.
The regular season schedule will conclude at Whittier Christian October 4 at 7 p.m. and at Campbell Hall October 11 at 2:30 p.m.Brentwood was 8-3 last season and made it to the CIF Division 13 playoffs where it defeated Chadwick and lost to St. Margarets of San Juan Capistrano.