Coaching for Pizza: The Start of Another Camarillo Stingers Season

Wednesday, May 28, 2025

The Start of Another Camarillo Stingers Season

Mon.-Wed., May 19-28, 2025

In which another season of football starts both at home and abroad, we meet up with beloved friends and attend a football reunion.

Just when we thought that our sports seasons with the grandkids were finally on hiatus for awhile, we found out that Jacob's Pop Warner football team was starting their practices on May 20th with practices from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

So much for down time.

Here are a few photos from the first three nights of Camarillo Stingers Senior Blue team workouts. This team is made up of next Fall's 8th Graders and is Jacob's last season before going to high school.

Woodside Park is a good spot

for training

Jacob, with his signature headband,

at DE coming off the edge

HANDS UP!

The Stingers passing game

looks promising

Jacob on the right in a two-point

stance at DE

Now in a three-point stance, I think

that he gets off the ball much faster

this way

Friday was a fun and busy day.

First up was a drive down to La Cañada-Flintridge for lunch with two old friends.

A cool, old vehicle in the

restaurant's parking garage

The usual two hour lunch with Paul Sabolić and Michael D'Antuono from our shared University of Washington days is always a treat for me.

I am not allowed to take photos of our group as my friends are both in the Federal Witness Protection Program.

After lunch, I had to drive pell-mell to Thousand Oaks H.S. to meet up with more friends at a baseball game.

It was a BEAUTIFUL day for

a baseball game

C.I.F.-S.S. Division 4 Quarterfinals

Woodbridge Warriors (21-9)

Third Place in the Pacific Coast League

Thousand Oaks Lancers (17-12)

Fifth Place in the Marmonte League

It was a rollicking, back

and forth ballgame

We were at the game to support more U. of W. friends, Loren and Sandy Brucker. Their son Ryan is the Head Baseball Coach at Woodbridge H.S. in Irvine, CA.

Sandy and Loren with Laurie

Michael and Ryan's brother-in-law Josh

As I said, it was a good game but one bad inning defensively for Woodbridge led to 6-3 win for Thousand Oaks.

The Rio Mesa H.S. Athletic Hall of Fame held their Second Annual Induction dinner the night after Memorial Day. One of the five inductees was the entire 1971 C.I.F.-S.S. "A" Championship football team.

I was invited to attend a pre-induction reunion on Memorial Day of this team at The Sportsman in Camarillo.

With Steve Lopez

Steve famously kicked the clutch Field Goal in the Semifinals

at end of the game to send the Spartans to the Championship Game. The final score of that Semifinal game was Rio Mesa 10 - Rim of the World 7.

The Spartans (10-2) beat Paso Robles Bearcats, 28-20, in the Championship Game the following week.

Of note, this is still the only Rio Mesa football team to win a C.I.F.-S.S. title.

13 Spartans with Coach Dick Bellman

Another ten Spartans would be in attendance at the induction ceremony the following evening.

I, for one, had a great time hearing some great stories.

On to news from the net . . .

The Varese Skorpions finished

the IFL regular season at 6-4

After a slow start, the Varese eleven won their final four games of the season.

The Italian Football League features the country's 12 best teams divided into two, six team conferences known simply as Group A and Group B. Each team plays their other five conference opponents twice but does not play any games against squads from the other conference.

With the regular season now completed, it's ON TO THE PLAYOFFS!