Win or lose, coaches will remain close

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With all the warrior verbage in football -- Crush them! Break their will! Destroy! -- you would expect Annenberg Coach Joseph Casale to spend this week building a hatred in his team for Fulton Prep, their opponent in Friday’s City 8-man football championship at Contreras High.

That isn’t the case, Casale said. Sure the third-seeded Panthers (8-5) want to win, in part to avenge an earlier loss to the fourth-seeded Jaguars (7-4) although Fulton Prep had to forfeit the victory. But ‘hate’ is not a word in Casale’s coaching vocabulary. Plus he and Fulton Prep Coach Sean Jackson are friends.

‘Sean and I have talked a couple of times a week since the season started,’ Casale said. ‘We have a mutual respect on how the game is played. We don’t send kids out there to hurt one another.

‘I remember the first week saying to Sean ‘we’ll see you at Contreras’ (in the title game). It’s great that we both kept that promise.’

-- Mike Terry