Mike Alberghini has a football team that he can really unleash.
But he can't. Not for long stretches, anyway. Not now.
Alberghini is the football coach for the top-ranked Grant Pacers whose team is actually too good, too fast, too superior in every regard for the overwhelmed members of the Metropolitan Conference.
So Alberghini has a first half, sometimes a first quarter, to polish his team's passing attack, to try any trick plays, because to do any of that in the second half would really crush the opponent.
Grant has outscored teams 367-7 this season. Grant beat Johnson 62-0, Rosemont 56-7 and Sacramento 63-0. Against Kennedy on Friday night, the score was so lopsided there was a running clock in the second quarter. I have never heard of a running clock in the second quarter. It was needed.
Grant led 71-0 at the half and won 85-0 with reserves playing the better part of three quarters.
Alberghini wants his team to play hard, to compete, but he will not pile it on an overmatched opponent to pad stats, for any sake of state rankings. Not his style and the damage is too long lasting.
Still, what does he tell his reserves? Don't compete as hard as the starters? Don't run as fast?
"You can't tell kids who work hard, who practice hard and lift year round not to play hard," Alberghini said. "If they do that, then when it's a game when it's close and they give a half effort, then you get mad at them.
"It's hard. After 11 carries, I had to tell (leading rusher Devontae) Butler, 'I can't run you any more.' And I had to say we couldn't pass any more. But you want to stay sharp, too."
Grant has a bye this week and McClatchy in Week 9 and then a showdown with rival Burbank in Week 10, when the Pacers could actually play their starters into the fourth quarter. Then, in a Sac-Joaquin Section Division II playoff bracket that promises to be a meat grinder, the starters will play start to finish.
