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Farewell, old friend. Those words were heard over the summer for at least four former San Diego-area football players. Doug Dunnam,  75,  was a starting guard on the 1956 City Prep League-champion Hoover team that upset San Diego High, 20-12, before a roaring, record, overflow crowd of  9,000 persons at Hoover. Dunnam  also was a member of the San Diego team ...

Dick Huddleston won championships in multiple sports, as player and as coach —He was a  tight end and linebacker on the 1960 Escondido team that won the first  large-school San Diego Section football championship. –Huddleston coached Point Loma to the 1973 San Diego Section baseball title. And  led La Jolla to the 1993 San Diego Section Division III ...

Now wait just a grape-pickin’ minute! Students at Escondido High were up in arms. They did not cotton to the term Grape Pickers or its use to describe the school’s athletic teams, although the wine-making fruit held agricultural sway in the area and the city had hosted a Grape Day Festival since 1908. The students wanted a tough, ...

With Frank Buncom IV leading the defense and explosive running back Elijah Preston propelling the offense, St. Augustine might have more good players than last season’s 11-2 team but could be hard pressed proving it. The Saints have stayed close to home for most of  the San Diego Section’s first 54 years, but they’re stepping out this season, with road games ...

Preseason games don’t have the import of regular-season contests, which carry the prestige of potential league championships and playoff seedings, but the early intersectionals have their own realities. Do well in these games and gain ratings. Have high ratings and increase the possibility of state playoff invitations. Many intersectionals will be played the week of Aug. 29, with ...

They could have asked Bennie Edens. Writers and prep experts comprising the selection panel for The San Diego Union weekly Top 10 may well have consulted the Point Loma coach. No one could have offered more expert testimony than Bennie. The peninsula wise man coached his 38th team at the Chatsworth Boulevard enclave and lost to the No’s. 1, ...

Successive records of 4-7, 0-10, and 6-6, had turned whispers into shouts at Vista. Had Dick Haines, borrowing baseball parlance, lost the hop on his fastball? Two state No. 1 rankings, three San Diego Section titles, and 11 league championships were a distant memory until the Panthers shot down Morse, 21-7, in the season’s third week, erasing 57-14 ...

Fullback Eddie Silva, who passed away recently in San Diego, where he was born, was the leading scorer in the County in 1949 and Point Loma won a championship. Silva and Marshall (Scooter) Malcolm were touchdown twins for coach Don Giddings’ squad, which posted a 9-1-1 record and rolled to the Southern California minor division championship. Silva scored 13 ...

John McFadden’s  announced decision to step down as head coach at Eastlake leaves  nine active San Diego Section coaches with at least 100 victories. McFadden became the Titans’ head coach in 2000 and posted a record of 120 wins, 42 losses, and 4 ties in 14 seasons. McFadden’s  .735 winning percentage is third only  to the active John Carroll of Oceanside (234-74-6, ...

The result of the Eastern League’s vote to determine its champion after a three-way tie for first was considered by some so egregious that even the coach of a potential playoff opponent led the shouting. San Diego High was the selection of the league’s principals after the Cavemen finished with a 5-1 record, same as St. ...

The names that figure to be shouted out in 2015 are Labrie-Smith and Johnson from Cathedral, Acolatse from Mission Hills, with maybe a raised voice by Mongiovi from West Hills. All were underclass standouts among the women, who made the most noise on what was, at best, another average season by San Diego Section athletes, at least ...

Not exactly the stuff of Agatha Christie, but mystery surrounded  “The Missing First Downs”. La Jolla and Calexico engaged in a Southern California Lower Division playoff at La Jolla. The game ended in a 6-6 tie, but The San Diego Union reported the next day that the Vikings “won”, 7-6, and advanced to a championship encounter. As Union ...

Happy Father’s Day! Oregon’s Mac Fleet defended his national collegiate 1,500-meter run championship with a time of 3:39.09 yesterday, helping the Ducks win their first men’s championship since 1984. Nosing out Arizona’s Lawi Lalang, who was seeking a ninth NCAA individual championship, Fleet made a powerful stretch run in front of his parents, Dale and Jana Fleet, and ...

As far back as early season 1989, Morse coach John Shacklett was able to smile through a 2-2 start and a forfeit win, supported by a mantra that the best was yet to come. This was after the Tigers had defeated Orange Glen, 31-28, for the 1988 3-A championship and not about the potential of the ...

A couple hard-knocking hurdlers from Cathedral and a shot putter from Madison furnished the star power for the San Diego Section in the boys’ 96th and girls’ 41st State high school track and field championships over the weekend in Clovis. Doton Ogundeji of Madison, overcoming a fouled-filled, nonqualifying 163-foot effort in Friday’s discus trials, won the shot ...

The San  Diego Section has 16 state top 10 performances, compared with 18 two weeks ago and 11 last week as the 96th meet championships loom this weekend at Clovis’ Buchanan High. There are many scoring opportunities for the local group after a strong finish to the San Diego Section season Saturday at Mt. Carmel, but the ...

Were the San Diego Section trials yesterday the “proof of the pudding” for area qualifiers who now enter the two most important weeks of the season? Section finals will be Saturday at Mt. Carmel High, followed  by the state meet in Clovis June 6-7. While the ancient proverb may not apply, San Diego athletes did  not come close to season ...

It’s that time of year. Fire-delayed league finals didn’t slow San Diego Section track and field athletes in their pursuit of May-June honors. Seven new state top 10 performances were recorded (see table below). Poway’s Brandon Lucas turned a wind-assisted :10.64 100 meters and hustled to a :21.18 200 (County No. 13 all-time) in the Palomar League finals. ...

Tim Danielson was convicted last week in El Cajon Superior Court of murdering his ex-wife in 2011.  His expected sentence of 50 years to life is pending. I’d like to remember Danielson as the billiant runner who competed  for coach Harry Taylor at Chula Vista High and set San Diego Section standards in 1965-66 that still are unequaled, 48 years ...

Poway’s 400-meter relay team was as hot as the 100-degree  weather at the Escondido Invitational last night. A Titans foursome of Will James, Jarod Turnage, Brandon Lucas, and Lance Mudd flawlessly passed the baton and covered the toasty, all-weather layout  in :41.62, fourth fastest time in California this year. It is rarefied air for the Titans, whose previous best was :42.02, and ...