03 Sep Spartans Football Starts Season With Win in Battle of Top 50-Ranked Teams

De La Salle and Lakeland High faced off Aug. 29 for the first time since 2009, when the Dreadnaughts won in Concord by one point; this time, the Spartans came out on top.

Story and photos by Joe Porrello

Two of the nation’s top 50 high school football teams faced off Friday night in Concord, where No. 28 De La Salle opened its season with a hard-fought 10-6 win over No. 50 Lakeland (Fla.) High.

Roughly 2,000 fans packed the stands for the Max Preps game of the week, featuring a Spartans team ranked No. 8 in California and a Dreadnaughts squad sitting at No. 9 in Florida.

 

Both teams entered the matchup coming off one-loss seasons, with those defeats occurring in their respective state championship games last December. With Lakeland High starting their season by winning last week, De La Salle looked to move past their title game defeat at the hands of Santa Ana’s Mater Dei High — the nation’s top-ranked team then and now. 

The game started slowly, with both offenses having trouble just earning enough yardage for a first down. The Dreadnaughts missed a field goal attempt while forcing the Spartans into two punts and a turnover on downs during the opening quarter.

“Those guys are really good, and we knew coming [in] that they’re very well coached, incredibly athletic, and that we were in for a dog fight,” said Spartans head coach Justin Alumbaugh.

 

Stout defensive play kept the squads scoreless until De La Salle senior kicker Justin Uribarri made a 23-yard field goal just before halftime to give the Spartans a three-point edge.

Coming out of the break, De La Salle senior defensive back Trisshon Wright intercepted a pass and set his team up about 30 yards from the endzone. 

The Spartans looked to convert on fourth down when Lakeland High quickly snatched the momentum back, as senior linebacker Ziggy Riley scooped up a fumble and rumbled 70 yards for the game’s first touchdown. Following a missed extra point attempt, the score sat at 6-3.

De La Salle took an ensuing kick return past midfield but again failed to capitalize. Lakeland High then drained the final three minutes of the third quarter and over half of the fourth quarter. Strategically moving down the field methodically, the Dreadnaughts could not complete a fourth down conversion and turned it back over to the Spartans.

 

With about three minutes remaining De La Salle’s 6-foot-5 senior tight end Landon Cook made a 38-yard catch, setting his team up at the 6-yard line. 

“An adrenaline rush came straight through my body — I knew we were going to score,” said Cook. “It was smashmouth football the whole game, and we needed a big play to break it up.”

On the very next play, senior Spartans running back Deuce Jones-Drew rumbled in for a touchdown on the ground and gave the Spartans a lead they would not relinquish.

“We knew it was going to be a tough week and that they were going to be physical,” said Jones-Drew. “I’m from Florida, so this game meant a lot to me.” 

Jones-Drew grew up about a three-hour drive from Lakeland while his father, Maurice — who was born in Pinole and attended De La Salle — played running back for the Jacksonville Jaguars from 2006 to 2013.

While the Spartans continued their home winning streak that dates back to 2023, the Dreadnaughts — who flew about 2,800 miles and across three time zones to the Bay Area — suffered a defeat on the road for the time since 2021.

Cook said De La Salle players were proud of avenging a loss from 2009 against Lakeland High. In their only previous head-to-head matchup, the Spartans lost 31-30 in overtime on their home turf to a Dreadnaughts team led by legendary coach Bill Castle.

Castle guided Lakeland High for 47 years and is 13th all-time in U.S. high school football coaching with 474 all-time wins. His opposing coach that day in 2009, Bob Ladouceur, is just as celebrated.

Portrayed in the 2014 Hollywood film “When the Game Stands Tall,” Ladouceur won 399 games in 34 years with De La Salle and during that time had more North Coast Section titles (28) than games lost, 10 national championships, and a 151-game win streak from 1992 to 2004 that more than doubled the previous record of consecutive victories.

 

Their successors have also fared well, with Dreadnaughts head coach Marvin Frazier going 27-1 in his first two years at the helm and Alumbaugh holding a record of 73-14 his past seven seasons.

In their first home game of the season Friday, Lakeland High takes on Lake Mary High, ranked No. 13 in Florida. 

De La Salle begins a three-game road stretch Saturday with a visit to Junipero Serra High in San Mateo, where the Spartans will face a Padres team ranked No. 28 in California.