Grant football bounds into 2025 with high hopes as Sacramento’s ‘city school’
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Grant Pacers prepare for 2025 season with deep roster and returning talent.
- Co-head coach Carl Reed enters Year 5 after leading back-to-back title runs.
- Pacers open season Aug. 23 vs. Folsom in ESPN-featured Saturday night game.
The parking lot is torn up, in full make-over mode that will include the installation of a sea of solar panels.
Nearby on the Del Paso Heights campus, the Grant Pacers can be found every afternoon at work inside William Rutherford Stadium. The team is every bit a promising work in progress as a football juggernaut with a lot of pedigree and a lot to prove.
A Tuesday afternoon practice included more than 60 Pacers in action, each wearing helmets and yellow Pacers T-shirts that match their vibrant yellow lids and optimism. An army of coaches put the players through drills, and things figure to heat up a bit next week when full contact hitting is allowed.
And one thing about the storied Pacers: They relish the opportunity to crash into others, to engage in contact, to be felt and to be heard. Grant is a three-time defending CIF Sac-Joaquin Section champion and also a defending state champion with a host of returning players geared for another championship campaign.
The Pacers are massive and experienced in the trenches with Ronnie Noa-Keil (6 feet, 305 pounds), Roger Vanderhoef (6-8, 345), and Lucio Dominguez (6-3, 275). They are quick on the outside with star junior receivers Koby Shabazz and the 6-6 Zo Edwards, and they fast in the backfield with running backs such as Tyson Griffin.
The team is breaking in a new quarterback after the graduation of leader Luke Alexander as Shiren Crump and Blake Nycum take over, which led position coach Josiah Johnson to say, “We have two Division I college quarterbacks here. Both of them are ready to go.”
“The pieces are all there,” Grant co-head coach Carl Reed said. “On paper, we look great. But we have to show it on the field.”
‘Proud to represent Sacramento’
Reminding all comers that Grant resides on 1400 Grand Ave., the Pacers roster is bolstered by players who had brothers, cousins, uncles and fathers who suited up in Pacers gear before them, some of them part of the program’s 10 section and two CIF State winning squads.
Reed played for the Pacers in the 1990s, and co-coach Syd Thompson was a Pacers star in the 2000s. A host of Grant coaches are alums of the school that opened in 1932 and is the third oldest high school in the state capital behind Sacramento and Christian Brothers.
Reed’s father is also a “Pacer4Life,” a decades-long moniker for those who embrace all things Grant. A Grant graduate, Lynn Reed was a longtime junior varsity football coach and track coach, and he is back in charge of the Pacers JV team. Father and son are tight, with the son reminding that the father was a more accomplished player.
Carl Reed doesn’t take his role as a coach, mentor and leader lightly. He had the task of replacing the region’s winningest coach, the late, great Mike Alberghini who won 282 games and who died last year. For years a Pacers assistant coach, Reed’s first team at Grant as head coach in 2021 won a single game.
His second season in 2022 saw the Pacers storm back, going 12-2 and winning a section, Northern California and CIF State championship. Grant went 12-3 in 2023 with repeats in the section and NorCal finals before dropping tight contests to La Serna of Whittier in the CIF State finals.
And last season, Grant went 12-3 and three-peated in section and NorCal play and beating Pacifica of Oxnard of Ventura County 35-28 in the state finals.
So here comes 2025 with Reed and company ready to roll.
“Every year is special,” Reed said. “This is Year 5 for me as coach. I never forget Year 1. So you appreciate it.”
Grant opens the season on Aug. 23 against four-time defending section Division I champion Folsom, a Saturday night game that will be on ESPN.
Grant also takes on state powerhouse programs in Cardinal Newman of Santa Rosa, De La Salle of Concord and Lincoln of San Diego before seeking a repeat in the Metro League that includes Destiny Christian Academy of Sacramento and West Park of Roseville.
“We’re Grant, a city school, and we’re proud to represent Sacramento,” Reed said.
What’s allowed before official kickoff?
Schools under the umbrella of the governing body California Interscholastic Federation’s Sac-Joaquin Section were allowed to engage in “limited” participation from July 15-27, which included conditioning, drills and weight-room activities, but no full contact or helmets or shoulder pads are allowed.
Teams this week were allowed to participate in drills with helmets and pads. Full contact starts Monday. Teams will generally have intrasquad scrimmages on Aug. 8, with game-like scrimmages against other programs Aug. 15-16.
The first official kickoff is Aug. 22-23.