They play pretty good football in the CIF Central Section, a storied region heavy on teams from the Fresno and Bakersfield areas.
The
Central East (Fresno) Bengals have a trophy case full of hardware, including two CIF state championships, the most recent coming last season to cap a 14-1 season.
So imagine the determination at a chance of payback last Friday with a home game against the very program that stuck the Bengals with their only setback in 2025. Central East was shorthanded with some star players sidelined with injury but had enough to overwhelm
Grant (Sacramento), 42-12, in one of the most anticipated games on the state menu.
Grant beat Central East, 42-26, in the second game of the 2025 campaign, but the Bengals regrouped and never looked back under coach Kyle Biggs. Senior quarterback
Jelani Dippel completed 20 of 28 passes for 358 yards and four touchdowns in the rematch, and he rushed 11 times for 90 yards. He found
Titus Thomas for two touchdown strikes.
Dippel passed for 4,583 yards and 58 touchdowns in 2025 while rushing for 518 yards and four scores.
Ranked third in Northern California, Central East plays another CIF Sac-Joaquin Section powerhouse on Friday, facing
Oak Ridge (El Dorado Hills), which defeated Grant, 9-7, in a section Division I semifinal last season. Oak Ridge and Grant each returned 18 starters.
Central East (Fresno) quarterback Jelani Dippel threw for 358 yards and four touchdowns to lift the NorCal No. 3 Bengals over Grant (Sacramento) last week. (PHOTO: Richard Posada)
2. De La Salle (Concord), (1-0)
3. Central East (Fresno), (1-0)
4. Oak Ridge (El Dorado Hills), (1-0)
5. Pittsburg, (1-0)
6. Junipero Serra (San Mateo), (0-1)
7. Grant (Sacramento), (0-1)
8. Archbishop Riordan (San Francisco), (0-1)
9. Saint Francis (Mountain View), (1-0)
10. Cardinal Newman (Santa Rosa), (0-1)
11. San Ramon Valley (Danville), (1-0)
12. Clovis West (Fresno), (2-0)
13. St. Mary's (Stockton), (1-0)
14. Buchanan (Clovis), 2-0
15. Manteca, (0-1)
16. Woodcreek (Roseville), (1-0)
17. Del Oro (Loomis), (1-0)
18. Granite Bay, (1-0)
19. St. Ignatius College Prep (San Francisco), (1-0)
20. Edison (Stockton), (1-0)
21. Central Catholic (Modesto), (0-1)
22. Acalanes (Lafayette), (1-0)
23. Los Gatos, (1-0)
24. Monte Vista (Danville), (1-0)
25. Valley Christian (San Jose), (1-0)
Folsom grinds out OT winNorCal top-ranked Folsom squeezed out a 23-17 overtime victory over No. 10 Cardinal Newman, thanks to special teams.
The Bulldogs blocked two field goals, including one late in the fourth quarter by Sacramento State-bound senior
Lua DeBerry that led to overtime. From there, Cal-committed quarterback
Brody Rudnicki carried four consecutive times to score the winner as the ball was placed on the 25, per state overtime rules.
Folsom players and coaches said afterward that they must up their game with state-ranked
Mission Viejo of Orange County coming to town, the only team to defeat Folsom last season. Folsom recovered just fine, capping a 14-1 season with the program's sixth CIF state crown since 2010.
No. 2 De La Salle beat host Serra under the lights, 35-25, behind a big night from
Jaxon Loftin. The senior completed 12 of 18 passes for 196 yards and three touchdowns, and UCLA-bound senior back
Duece Jones-Drew rushed 18 times for 84 yards and scored two fourth-quarter touchdowns as DLS coach Justin Alumbaugh edged his longtime friend, Patrick Walsh, the Serra coach who was a DLS star in the early 1990s.
De La Salle plays Cardinal Newman and Serra plays at
Kahuku (Hawaii) this week.
Oak Ridge, Sutter win in TexasOak Ridge and
Sutter, longtime NorCal powers, opened the 2026 season in Texas.
The teams stayed at the same hotel in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, took in the sites and sounds, including visiting steak houses and Dealey Plaza, where President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963.
Then the teams won their games in scoring a double-victory for NorCal teams.
Oak Ridge rallied to beat
Argyle (Texas), 27-26, behind the passing of
Nick Johnson (298 yards) and a stout defense, and Sutter downed
Bishop Lynch (Dallas), 49-28, behind
Losi Asiata's 280 yards rushing and four scores (he also caught a touchdown).
Oak Ridge coach Casey Taylor and Sutter coach Ryan Reynolds got to know each other a bit along the way.
American Canyon stuns Clayton Valley CharterIt required something of a miracle to pull it off, and there was
Kameron Hunter delivering in the crunch.
The
American Canyon quarterback fired a bomb to
Griffin Morgan for a 75-yard scoring strike for a 15-14 road victory over
Clayton Valley Charter (Concord) in one of the biggest upsets in the state over the opening weekend.
American Canyon went 9-2 last season and 13-2 in 2024, winning a CIF state championship. American Canyon opened in 2010 in Napa County and fielded its first good team in 2012, going 11-2.
DCA scores upset winDestiny Christian Academy (Sacramento) scored the biggest upset in the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section on Friday, stunning state-ranked
Inderkum (Sacramento), 28-12, to give Antuan Simmons his first head-coaching victory with the program that for decades was known as Capital Christian.
Vincent Scott passed for 156 yards,
K'Aden Minor ran for 112 yards and the lines dominated the action. DCA is in the Metro League that includes Grant.
Saint Francis tops MantecaIn a showdown of NorCal sectional powers, Saint Francis beat a Manteca team that went 11-1 last season with a 31-23 final.
Drew Cumby dazzled in his starting quarterback debut, scoring on an 80-yard touchdown run and passing for 174 yards and two scores for the 17-time Central Coast Section championship program.
Saint Francis has another Sac-Joaquin Section powerhouse coming to town this week in Del Oro.
Joe Davidson has covered high school sports for The Sacramento Bee since 1989. He is a member of the California High School Football Hall of Fame and has been honored by the with the CIF Distinguished Service award and was the National Football Foundation legacy winner.
