Bee’s Best: No. 13 Cosumnes Oaks football welcomes new coach and cast of on-campus help
The Sacramento Bee will unveil our Top 25 football rankings from No. 25 to No. 1, at least a team a day, right up to the Aug. 20 kickoff.
No. 13 Cosumnes Oaks Wolfpack
City: Elk Grove
School opened: 2008
League: Delta
Division: I
Enrollment: 2,075
2021 spring record: 2-1
Coach: Martin Billings
Outlook: Martin Billings walked away from head varsity football coaching in the winter of 2002, spent from the rigors of the grind at Menlo-Atherton in the Bay Area and feeling a need to be a father/husband for three kids, all under age 3 at the time.
The one-time Oregon State lineman. who still looks the part, relocated to the Elk Grove Unified School District in 2003 to teach and coach, first at Sheldon High School, then a stop at nearby Monterey Trail before settling in six years ago at Cosumnes Oaks. And now he’s a head coach again, heading a Wolfpack program that has all the makings of a championship outfit.
Billings sets his aim at keeping CO a factor in the powerhouse Delta League.
“I’m excited, and it’s good to be a head coach at this level again,” Billings said this week from his school classroom, where he teaches social studies and world history, with decades-old Oakland Raiders pennants dotting his walls. “I wouldn’t do this without the blessing of my wife (Felicia) and the assistants we have here. They’ve been great. I wouldn’t do it without them.”
Billings has the benefit of an army of on-campus coaches, a luxury in any era. His staff includes Will Hightower, Lew Lassetter, Jack Pfau, Steve Robards and George Smith, also the athletic director. Hightower, Lassetter, Robards and Smith have been varsity head coaches before. Derrick Brown is a teacher at nearby Jackman Middle School and junior varsity coach Jake Pfau is a student-teacher on campus.
There may not be another program in the region with this many on-campus faces. But it’s players who impact the games the most, and CO has plenty of those, starting with new quarterback Steven Duran, a third-year starter at safety who takes over the lead position on offense from graduated All-Metro star Anthony Grigsby, Jr.
“Duran was our freshman quarterback when I was helping coach that level here,” Billings said. “He makes all the throws, he’s very savvy, smart, a leader and a football guy.”
The secondary also includes second-year starting safety Deonte Carter, also a fine basketball player, and second-year starter DeJohn Marshall, who Billings says has, “outstanding quickness, hands and is expecting to have a breakout season.”
The lines include second-year varsity starter Jaiden Carranza, just a sophomore, who has, as coach Billings says, “strength, athleticism and leadership qualities.”
Manny Montanez is a senior tight end/linebacker. Carer and Marshall will also play receiver.
CO’s opener is a whopper — against 2019 Sac-Joaquin Section Division I champion Oak Ridge in El Dorado Hills on Aug. 20. It doesn’t get any easier with the Aug. 27 home opener against powerhouse Monterey Trail and other nonleague games against Manteca and Inderkum before the Delta League schedule of Davis, Sheldon, Pleasant Grove, Jesuit, Franklin and Elk Grove.
Billings looks rested now. He knows that may change when sleep becomes rumor.
“I’m ready!” he said with a laugh.