Sailors’ schedule finalized

Patrick Laverty

After first-round losses in each of the past two seasons in the CIF

Southern Section Division VI playoffs, Newport Harbor High football

coach Jeff Brinkley decided the remedy should be a more difficult

nonleague schedule.

The Tars have finalized their schedule for the 2004 season by

adding a season-opening game at Division I Fountain Valley and a Week

5 contest at Division III Mira Costa.

The Barons replace Trabuco Hills, which split two meetings with

the Sailors over the past two seasons, and the Mustangs take the spot

on Harbor’s schedule vacated by Paramount, which lost to the Tars in

each of the last two seasons.

The moves leave Newport Harbor with a nonleague schedule that

reads: Fountain Valley (away), three straight home games against

Marina (Division I), Corona del Mar (Battle of the Bay) and Dana

Hills (Division II), followed by the clash with Mira Costa.

It’s a difficult road for the Sailors, but one that Brinkley hopes

will improve their prospects in the Sea View League and the

postseason. Newport Harbor began the 2003 season with five straight

wins, but finished in fourth place in league (2-3) and needed an

at-large berth to get into the playoffs, where they were defeated by

eventual Division VI champion Los Altos.

“It’s a tougher nonleague schedule,” Brinkley said. “I’m adjusting

it because of the way things have changed in the division. Before, if

we were an at-large team, we still had a good chance to go to the

quarterfinals or even further. Now, if you’re the at-large team,

you’re not going very far. This helps in that it prepares you for

league play and, hopefully, if we’ve reached the playoffs, you’ve

already played a few more good teams.”

The Sailors won the Division VI championship in 1999, finished as

the runner-up in 2000 and made a semifinal appearance in 2001. But

Division VI became a stronger circuit prior to the 2002 season and

now includes Los Altos, an annual championship contender, and Orange

Lutheran, a burgeoning power, in addition to the Sailors’

traditionally difficult league foes, Foothill and Irvine.

Brinkley is hopeful that playing Fountain Valley and Mira Costa,

on the road, will help prepare the Sailors for the more stringent

competition later in the season.

Fountain Valley finished the 2003 season 8-4, sharing the Sunset

League championship with Edison and Los Alamitos before losing in the

Division I quarterfinals to Mater Dei. The Tars and Barons have met

six times in the past, splitting the meetings, but not since 1978

when they were both in the Sunset League.

Mira Costa has a 49-4 record over the past four years, including

three straight 10-0 regular seasons. The Mustangs lost in the

Division III semifinals to Notre Dame of Sherman Oaks in 2003,

finishing 12-1. In 2002 and 2000, they were Division III finalists

and reached the semifinals in 2001. Mira Costa and Newport Harbor

have never met.