Scores 5 TD’s in SEC Championship game, named MVP; showered with national honors; Heisman presentation Thursday on ESPN; will play in Rose Bowl Jan. 1

By Jesus Cano

University of Alabama running back Najee Harris has taken the college football world by storm this season, but anyone who saw him play at Antioch High School knew this would happen

On Saturday night, Harris and the No. 1 ranked Crimson Tide took down No. 7 Florida in the SEC championship, where he was named the MVP. He recorded five touchdowns, three receiving and two rushing, and 245 all-purpose yards. His performances all season have put him in the conversation for the Heisman Trophy – given to the best college football player, for which he’s been training. Harris is one of the final five candidates, voting ended on Monday, Dec. 21, and the 2020 Heisman Trophy Finalists Reveal Show will be held Thursday, Dec. 24 at 4:30 pm Pacific Time on ESPN, and the winner presented on Jan. 5.

“A lot of stuff has happened this year,” Harris said. “We’re happy to be here.” (See his postgame press conference)

Overall, during his senior season, the 6-foot-2-inch, 230-pound Harris rushed for 24 touchdowns and 1,262 yards, for a total of 1,578 yards including 312 receiving, after choosing to stay in school to play one more year and forego entering the NFL draft. For Harris’ four-year college career, he has 4,311 total yards, including 3,649 rushing.

Harris is Alabama’s all-time leader in career touchdowns, surpassing current NFL running backs Derrick Henry and Mark Ingram, and Seattle Seahawks legend, Shaun Alexander. Harris is also just 101 yards shy of breaking the all-time rushing yards record at Alabama.

Last week, he was chosen one of three finalists for the Jason Witten Collegiate Man of the Year award, which is presented annually to the Division I college football player who has demonstrated a record of leadership by exhibiting exceptional courage, integrity and sportsmanship both on and off the field. The award honors exemplary character and commitment to community, family and teammates.

In the description of Harris for that award, it reads, “One of the nation’s top running backs, Harris has…overcome a challenging childhood in which he faced homelessness to become a vocal leader during the Alabama team’s social justice movement and one of the main voices for his university’s push towards a more unified campus. He has also been an active member in the Tuscaloosa community, recording nearly 50 hours of community service, highlighted by his volunteer efforts with the Alberta Head Start Unity Project.”

Harris is also one of 14 student-athletes named to the 2020 SEC Football Community Service Team for his work and  it was just announced on Monday, Dec. 21st during the National College Football Awards Association (NCFAA) honors presentation, he is one of three finalists for the Doak Walker Award. The honor was created in 1989 to recognize the nation’s premier running back for his accomplishments on the field, achievement in the classroom and citizenship in the community. The winner will be announced during The 30th Annual Home Depot College Football Awards show on Thursday, Jan. 7, at 4 p.m. PT, on ESPN.

Harris was also a semi-finalist for The Maxwell Award which is presented annually to the college football player judged by a panel of sportscasters, sportswriters, and NCAA head coaches and the membership of the Maxwell Football Club to be the best all-around in the United States.

Now, he and the Tide shift their focus to the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) College Football Playoffs, where Alabama will play No. 4 Notre Dame in the Rose Bowl game on Jan. 1 at 1:00 p.m. Due to the State of California COVID-19 health orders, the game won’t be played in Pasadena, but at AT&T Stadium in Arlington Texas, instead.

Harris committed to Alabama his sophomore year of high school, very early to decide even for an athlete as rated as he was. And while there were talks of last-minute flips to Michigan or Cal, Harris remained true to the Crimson Tide.

“Words can’t express how happy and proud I am for Najee,” Antioch defensive coordinator Brett Dudley said. “It’s amazing getting to see him every Saturday on TV and it was great to see he graduated a couple weeks ago. It’s great for the city of Antioch because he will forever be the inspiration for every kid growing up in Antioch. The best example there is that if you’re a great person and you do all the right things on and off the field, you can achieve all of your dreams.”

Harris ended his high school career with 99 touchdowns for the Panthers, with 7,948 rushing yards. Antioch went undefeated in 2015, winning its first league title since 1984. The following year, Antioch made it to the NCS DI championship, but came up short, losing to Monte Vista.

Allen Payton contributed to this report.

By Tom Lamothe

We are excited to offer this unprecedented opportunity of supporting the Antioch Sports Legends Museum and Program with an online auction event from November 19-22. For the first time in our 14-year history, we have the potential of connecting with all our alumni from across the nation for a fundraising event.

As this is just before Christmas, it’s the perfect time to buy gifts for you and your loved ones and help California’s best hometown sports museum.

This auction will have something for everyone. We have collected several one-of-a-kind Antioch sports memorabilia, along with home goods, electronics, national and international trips, sports memorabilia, lifetime experiences, and so much more. There are over 150 items in our auction!

All proceeds benefit the Antioch Sports Legends Museum and Program to cover our overhead with the Antioch Historical Society Museum and for displays, apparel, website cost, office supplies, and administrative expenses and to set us up for future success and projects.

Please register for the auction at: https://yourcharityauction.com/ASL

Make sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to keep yourself up to date on what is happening at the Antioch Sports Legends Museum. We’re located downstairs, inside the Antioch Historical Society Museum at 1500 W. 4th Street at the curve of Auto Center Drive. For now we are temporarily closed due to COVID-19. For more information visit www.antiochsportslegends.com or call (925) 238-0565.

By Tom Lamothe

Here’s a new story from our Recreation Section of the Antioch Historical Society Museum.

While most 68-year-old retired men are looking for an easy chair to rest in, David Martinez, better known as Butch, is working hard lifting weights in his home gym here in Antioch. The 1970 Antioch High grad has always enjoyed lifting, but things changed roughly 20 years ago. He became serious about lifting, more specifically, about bench pressing. As a member of the Big C Gym in Concord, he entered his first bench press competition after being encouraged by a staffer and walked away with a nice 18-inch first place gold trophy cup. Encouraged by his newly found success, Butch entered the upcoming Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) power lifting contest and to his surprise, won the Gold again.

In the following two decades Butch continued to enter sanctioned competitions by the AAU, the International Power Lifting Association, and The World Association of Bench Pressers and Dead Lifters (WABDL). Sanctioned competitions are heavily regulated and have drug testing, age and weight classifications and smaller sub-groups. Such sub-groups as, the RAW classification- for those who don’t wear special wraps and uniforms to support the strain on joints when lifting. There’s also the Law-Fire classification, which is due to one of Butch’s job classifications at the Contra Costa Water District. In these decades he would enter the 47 to 67-year-old age groups, the 220-pound weight class, RAW, and Law-Fire Divisions. When recently visiting Butch he wasn’t training due to COVID-19 and didn’t enter the WABDL competition in Las Vegas. Noticing a paunch, but well developed arms, I wondered why he wasn’t more muscular, and in Butch’s typical sense of humor he said, “That’s the pretty boys in body building, in weight lifting we’re fat old bald guys!” All kidding aside, Butch’s 20 years of accomplishments speaks for themselves!

At the AAU level Butch garnered three World Records and four International Championships. In WABDL competitions, he lifted in over 40 meets and 20 State championships. During these competitions Butch won 16 State Championships, eleven World Championships, and set five WABDL World Records. It would be in 2005 at the WABDL California State Championships held in Monterey that Butch would achieve his greatest accomplishment, an All-Time Best, 435.2 bench press, establishing a World Record in his classifications. Today, his 297.5-pound bench press at the 64 year old, 220 pound weight class in the RAW, Law-Fire Division, stands a WABDL World Record.

In recognition of Butch’s years of endurance and accomplishments, he was honored by being inducted into the WABDL Hall of Fame at the 2018 World Championships in Las Vegas. Congratulations Butch on your career and you’re well deserving WABDL Hall of Fame Induction!

Planned for the relocation of the Antioch Paintball Park so that land can be used for horse boarding and training facility

By Allen Payton

According to Scot Pearson, president of the Antioch Little League, they are going to lose one of their three fields on the county fairgounds property that they’ve been using since 1956. An announcement was sent out via email asking for supporters of the league to attend tonight’s meeting of the fair board, officially known as the 23rd District Agricultural Association Board of Directors. (See bottom of article.)

Pearson wrote letters to Assemblyman Jim Frazier and even to U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein asking for their assistance in keeping the third field in play.

In a letter to the fair board dated November 23, 2019, he wrote:

Members of the Board,

I am sending out this letter to make you all aware of the correspondence over this last week with County Fair Board Director Joe Brengle. On Friday, November 15, 2019, I received a phone call from Mr. Brengle requesting a meeting in his office to go over some changes that may apply to our 2020 field lease contract. The current contract expires on December 31, 2019. I agreed to meet with him in his office on Monday, November 18, 2019, at 2:00 pm.

I arrived at 1:55pm on Monday for the meeting as scheduled. Joe told me that there could be changes in the future lease agreement. He asked me about the area of our layout that Women’s Auxiliary Field and Scorebooth reside. He says he notices it isn’t used as much as the other 2 fields and if it was vital to our upcoming season. I was honest with him and said that we use it primarily for girls softball, but as of this moment, it doesn’t look like we will be fielding too many, if any at all, softball teams in 2020. He then informs me that the Fair Board is considering an offer from a catering truck company who wishes to set their catering truck fleet and kitchen on the property. The property they wish to use and renovate will displace Jeff’s paint ball gun facility and leave no place for his business. Would we be willing to “share” the area where WA field is located with the paint ball gun club? He then said that our rent was going to go up, but if we agree to share the area with Jeff, he thinks he can keep our rent price the same by only using the other 2 fields. I told him it may be doable, but that decision would have to be made by our Board of Directors after reviewing the written proposal from the Fair Board. He said, and I quote; “Not to worry. Nothing is set in stone yet. The Fair Board meets in two weeks and then he will know more.” I said that’s fine and to update me after their meeting.

So, you can understand how surprised I was to get a call yesterday afternoon ( Nov. 22 ) from Jeff, asking me if we could meet with him ASAP and walk the area to point out services such as water and electricity because the paintball gun club is moving there. I told him I had just met with Joe and nothing finalized. Jeff told me that he just left a meeting with Mr. Brengle 10

minutes before he called me, and that Joe told him he had no choice other than to move his business onto our Women’s Auxiliary Field site, which has been there in use since 1972. Jeff said he had no choice. I told Jeff we had not agreed to anything yet as far as conceding or sharing the WA area. I agreed to meet with Jeff at 11:00am on Monday, November 25, on Women’s Auxiliary field to further discuss this matter.

It seems to me that the County Fair Board is set on pushing out established community based youth organizations to try and make more money. This property was provided years back to serve as a gathering spot for groups and events put on by local organizations. It wasn’t set up as a source of income for Contra Costa County or anyone else. Antioch Little League (1957), Antioch

Speedway, 4H club and the Skating Rink are just a few of the organizations/businesses that have provided a safe place for fun and education for our young community members for decades. Where does it end?

I would ask my sitting board members or any concerned citizens to please attend Monday’s 11:00am meeting at Women’s Auxiliary field at the Contra Costa County Fairgrounds, or “Event Park” as it has been renamed. Please feel free to contact me directly at (925) 437-3551 with any questions or relative information regarding this letter.

Sincerely,

Scot Pearson

Contra Costa Event Park CEO Brengle Responds

Asked why this was happening, Joe Brengle, CEO of the Contra Costa Event Park (fairgrounds) said, “They are a tenant of ours. They are on a year to year lease. We are taking away one of their three fields which they have not been utilizing for redeveloping the property. We are moving the paintball park there and redeveloping that area into a horse boarding and training facility.”

Asked if the league was getting compensated, he said, “The Women’s Auxiliary didn’t donate that land. They donated money to improve it. That was 50 years ago.”

“The decision was already made by the board,” Brengle continued. “Antioch Little League has refused to sign the agreement for their yearly lease which would have started March 1st, until they have had the opportunity to speak to the board.”

Asked when the decision was made, he responded, “Back in November I met with the Antioch Little League president (Pearson) to let him know what would be happening. I’ve met with him three more times.”

The decision was made at the fair board’s meeting in December 2019. But neither Scot Pearson nor anyone else from the Antioch Little League attended the meeting.

“We’re not taking it away until the end of May at the end of their season,” Brengle explained. “They have some playoff games. The other two fields can accommodate those games.” New Fairgrounds-Antioch Little League lease 2020

When reached for comment, Pearson said, “I did (meet with Joe Brengle). I wrote a letter to (Assemblyman Jim) Frazier the very next day. Then I met with Jeff Warrenburg (owner of the paintball park) about sharing the property with Antioch Paintball, which is what Joe Brengle said we could do.”

Asked why he nor anyone from Antioch Little League were at the board meeting in December when it was decided, he said, “I wasn’t invited and I thought we were going to be able to work things out. Jeff said he didn’t know anything about it.”

“Then, when I got the contract the language changed,” Pearson stated. “The third ballfield will be available…through May 31 at which time it will be redeveloped.”

“When we went in and met with Joe, he already had plans drawn up. This isn’t the board but him pushing this,” he continued.

Asked if they still have time to work things out, since they will still be able to play the season using the third field, Pearson responded, “We usually play games through the end of June. So, that’s not correct.”

“But, the paintball park is not going to be redeveloped into a horse boarding and training facility,” he added. “Instead, it’s going to be used for catering truck parking.”

Asked who told him that, he said, “Joe told me.”

Two of the fields which they keep in their agreement were recently improved by the Antioch Rotary Club. Asked about that, Pearson said they weren’t going to have them improve the field that they might lose.

He mentioned having baseball standouts from Antioch who have agreed to speak at tonight’s meeting.

“We have Butch Rounsaville and Aaron Miles (both former Major League Baseball players) who have agreed to speak, as well as Kenny Turnage,” Pearson shared. “I’m sure the board is going to be surprised. I heard from someone who contacted me that knows people on the board and that is what they told me.”

.”

The Fair Board meeting is at 7:00 p.m. at the Contra Costa Event Park, 1201 W. 10th Street in Antioch. View the meeting agenda, here. Since the item is not on the agenda, those who want to speak on the matter will have to do so during Public Comments.

 

Head for round three of playoffs next Wednesday night

By Allen Payton

The BVAL’s top boys’ basketball team from Deer Valley High, beat their first two opponents during the playoffs, this week. The games are a part of the “CIF North Coast Section 2020 Boys’ Basketball Championships – Division 1” tournament.

The Wolverines outscored the Amador Valley Dons 54-45 in Pleasanton during their first playoff game on Tuesday night, Feb. 18. (See game photos, here.)

Deer Valley then faced Heritage High in Brentwood, during the second playoff game, last night, Friday, Feb. 21 and beat the Patriots by a score of 60-42. That avenged their final game loss against Heritage – their only one during regular season – by just two points from a last second shot.

The 19-9 Wolverines will host the 23-5 Granada Matadors for the third-round playoff game on Wednesday night, Feb. 26 at 7 p.m. If Deer Valley wins that game, they will go on to play in the championship game against either De La Salle or Monte Vista. Date and time TBA.

By Luke Johnson 

Lucky number seven is the charm.

After six-straight losing seasons, the boys’ soccer team at Antioch High School reached the playoffs for the first time since 2013.

The Panthers (13-8-1) have a fierce offensive attack with four players finishing in the top eight for goals scored in the Bay Valley Athletic League.

At the top of the list is senior striker Ian Scheringer, who scored 21 goals in 17 matches — far more than anyone else in the league.

However, head coach Conrad Diaz said senior goalkeeper Melvin Morales is the real MVP. Morales is averaging 0.917 goals allowed per game this season.

Diaz said the Panthers are only getting better with the roster full of youth. There are three freshmen currently on the varsity team — one of whom Diaz gave extremely high praise.

“I think he can be the Najee Harris of soccer,” Diaz said.

Freshman midfielder Alvaro Picon only played 11 matches, but made his presence known with eight goals and 11 assists. Picon is also part of the U.S. Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program — which recruits the highest caliber players around the country to train them to potentially play for the U.S. men’s national team.

The Antioch boys’ soccer program reached the peak of its success a decade ago by winning back-to-back league championships in 2009 and 2010 respectively — the only two BVAL Championships in school history. Shortly thereafter, the Panthers finished seasons with goal differentials of 17-48 (2015) and 25-89 (2016). This season Antioch has a goal differential of 50-20, so far.

The Panthers faced Division I opponents in the Bay Valley Athletic League but, will compete in the Division II bracket of the North Coast Section Playoffs. Diaz said this gives his team an advantage, because his players are battle tested.

Antioch will play at Vallejo High School (17-4-4) in the first round of the playoffs Wednesday evening. Vallejo has a goal differential of 88-29 this season.

“They scored 88 goals, but they beat a team 18-0, and they’re playing Division IV and V teams,” Diaz said.

The furthest Antioch has gone in the NCS Playoffs was the semifinal round in 1995. For Diaz, this his return to the NCS Playoffs after a 45-year hiatus. He last competed in the NCS Playoffs as a player with Mission High School (San Francisco) in 1975.

End season in first place in BVAL; playoffs begin next week

By Jamauri Bowless

The Deer Valley High boys’ varsity basketball team ended their undefeated in league season with a to Heritage 42-40 on a game-winning shot with under three seconds left in the game. The Wolverines finished 17-9 overall, with a 9-1 league record.

The end the season in first place, trailed by Pittsburg, Liberty and Heritage tied for second with 5-5 records in league play, Antioch ended in third place with a 4-6 record, and in last place is Freedom with a record of 2-8.

Assistant Coach Quincy Smith said the team will find out seeding this Sunday when the North Coast Section (NCS) Division 1 playoff schedule is released.

Please check back with the Antioch Herald for more details.