Prep football: Beleaguered no more, Bella Vista is finally enjoying a bounce-back season
The hashtag can be found on T-shirts of faculty and staff members, family and friends. The motto is splashed prominently on a painted sign placed in front of the student section for home football games.
BV DUE.
It’s short for Bella Vista is due, and is that ever an understatement? How about long overdue and then some?
In the Sacramento-regional high school football scene, no program suffered so mightily on the field and endured an image beating quite like the Broncos. There was a stretch of four successive winless seasons, the mocking of “0-10, do it again!” There was a dreadful 48-game losing streak, second-worst in state history, that ended in 2021.
And worst of all: The image, fair or not, that this was a sad-sack operation spinning out in the ditch amid the tree-lined campus in Fair Oaks. The Broncos went 1-62 from 2016-2021.
That is all ancient history now, fodder for a new era of hope and promise. The Broncos are basking in their bounce-back year, walking with an extra bounce in their step at 4-1. That’s right. Four wins, one loss, and the expectations of producing the school’s first football winner since 2009.
A 28-21 win at River Valley in Yuba City on Sept. 16 marked the program’s first league victory in seven seasons. During the lean times, the Broncos measured progress by how many first downs they could muster and how often they could avoid the mercy running clock. Now they take the field expecting to win.
The home games are packed again in a cozy stadium off Madison Avenue that includes a new field. The marching band is as good as it gets. The student section is spirited and creative, and the alums have come out for a peek at a new era of Broncomania.
“It’s happening!” Broncos third-year coach Jim Gray said with typical good cheer. “I want this to be a team that can compete, that’s not an easy win for everyone, or to be everyone’s homecoming opponent. We don’t get taken lightly any more. I tell the kids that this is the way it’s supposed to be, if we work for it. We’re not a small school. We’re a large school, and I tell the kids, ‘Big school, play like a big school.’”
Amid the glow of progress, reality dropped like an anvil Thursday night in a Capital Valley Conference contest against visiting Antelope. The growing pains for a program still learning how to win are there. Antelope led 21-13 at the half and cruised past the Broncos 54-13. But there was no despair for BV. The better team won. Antelope has years of momentum with playoff teams, guys who live in the weight room. Those Titans have depth, and they went 10-0 last regular season.
Gray challenged his team afterward not fall into old habits, and don’t you dare drop your heads.
“I haven’t given up, so you don’t give up,” the coach the group, having invited parents, families, staff, fans and girlfriends of players to listen in. “It’s sports. It happens. We’ve got to fight back. Don’t forget: you’re 4-1. You have a chance to win more games. There are teams out there that are 0-5 and wish they had we have.”
Now that’s quite a statement, and it’s true. For years, no one wanted anything close to what Bella Vista had in football. Not the misery and punch lines. That’s all changed. Gray provides coaching stability. Bella Vista is a sleeping giant with the largest enrollment of any high school in the San Juan Unified School District with 2,039 students. It has nice facilities, a supportive faculty and administration. The participation numbers are higher than they’ve been in years, including bringing back a freshmen team. The junior varsity team is 5-0.
Bella Vista has had a sparkling national reputation in academics since it opened in 1960, and it has fielded scores of terrific sports teams across the board over the years, including baseball, basketball and track and field. But football often identifies a school in general, and it certainly can set a mood.
“A good team can give you a great start to the school year,” Bella Vista athletic director John Hardwick said. “We believe that if you play with character, play with heart, that good things will happen. And Jim Gray is good for these kids.”
Football lifer took on BV challenge
Gray doesn’t need this gig, but then again, he does. He’s a football lifer, having spent 36 years with a whistle and headset. He is closing in on his 61st birthday. A jovial, spirited fellow, Gray is retired from a 35-year career in probation but still works as a substitute teacher in the district because he enjoys working with kids.
Gray played linebacker at South Dakota State from 1980-84, in a state in which he grew up. His aching knees show the wear and tear as he waddles about like a penguin hustling off to a meal. He had pro tryouts in the USFL with George Allen and with the Miami Dolphins under another Hall of Fame coach in Don Shula.
Gray settled into coaching with roles at Yuba College, Del Campo, Bella Vista for five seasons in the early 1990s, the Placer Junior Hillmen youth program from 1997-2006 and then at Placer High from 2006-13, followed by seven years as an assistant at Sierra College. Gray was urged by former Bella Vista coach Doug Grush to take the BV job.
Grush is a fixture on campus, in his 26th year as a physical education teacher. His football teams were tough and physical in the 1990s and 2000s. Grush is gregarious and into his school, so much so that he will wear a long black wig and jam on a guitar during a student rally.
“I think it’s great what Jim’s doing here,” Grush said Thursday, decked in a red Bella Vista shirt. “Kids used to trash the football players on campus. It’s easy to pick on kids when they’re down, but what have you done to help? Be a part of the solution. Have dignity. That’s not a problem any more.”
Grush said a weightlifting program will boost Bella Vista even more. He had an early morning weight class for Bella Vista athletes when he was the football coach but that class is no longer an option. Strength and conditioning, any coach will tell you, makes fatigue late in games less of a concern and takes away any notion of quitting.
BV has a QB, playmakers and two pancake linemen
Bella Vista has a quarterback leader in Ian James. At 6-foot-4 and 230 pounds, he is a large lad charging down on defenders out of the team’s wing-T attack. He is a 4.0 student, a powerful lefty who gave up baseball pitching to chase his football dreams. And he’s getting recruiting interest, proof that one does not have to attend a state-ranked program to land on a college recruiting radar. He is a three-year starter and has seen the program turn first hand.
“It’s been a long journey,” James said of his program in general. “I had faith in the coaching staff to stick with football. That wasn’t our losing streak, not this team’s, but we had to avenge those teams. It’s exciting what we can do.”
Two-way Bella Vista linemen Etni Topete (6-4, 270) and Jacob Disney-Taylor (6-4, 255) have piled up pancake blocks on offense and are a load to deal with on defense. Receiver Damien Rickett is 6-4, 190 and fast. The team’s most versatile player is Carson Newman, who is 5-8 and 160 but is a blur. He runs the ball, plays cornerback, kicks and punts.
“Carson runs a legit 4.5 (40-yard dash), on grass,” Gray said. “”We tested him numerous times. He’s legit.”
The Broncos at long last are legit. On the practice field, a speed limit 55 sign is hard to miss. There are no more speed bumps for the Broncos. It’s all systems go.
This story was originally published September 23, 2022 at 12:30 PM.