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After going on a tear in the second half to break a tied game, the Monterey Trail Mustangs’ magical season will continue for at least one more week. After the first half of the Mustangs’ CIF Sac-Joaquin Section semifinal showdown against visiting Oak Ridge resulted in both teams scoring 14 points apiece inside Mark Macres…

The two coaches eyed each other, smiled and then embraced. Kris Richardson and T.J. Ewing know each other, have faced each other before as opponents and they respect each other. Richardson is the coach at Folsom High School, the region’s preeminent powerhouse. The Bulldogs are in a Sac-Joaquin Section championship game for the ninth consecutive…

At halftime with the game tied at 14, it looked as though Oak Ridge and Monterey Trail were two evenly matched teams and the game would be decided late in the fourth quarter.   Wrong.   Monterey Trail scored on five straight possessions, while the Oak Ridge offense only managed one more touchdown, as the…

After steamrolling through the Metro League, the number two seeded Monterey Trail Mustangs finally reached what they have been waiting all season long for, the playoffs. Being one of the top two seeded teams in the CIF Sac-Joaquin Division I Section Playoffs, along with top-ranked Folsom, the Mustangs received a first-round bye last week and…

In arguably their biggest challenge since facing Del Oro in early October, the Oak Ridge football team travels to Monterey Trail Friday to face the No. 2 seed in the Sac-Joaquin Section Division I playoffs. The teams have met only once before in the first round of the playoffs in 2015 with Oak Ridge coming…

Monterey Trail junior lineman Marcus Jones is consistently around the ball. At 6-foot-0 and 180 pounds, Jones doesn’t have wasted steps as he reads a play, knives around blockers and is a sure tackler at the ball.  Jones anchors on the second level for the Mustangs is should be on linebacker lists for the 2020…

The recruiting process had sped up in recent years, but a big senior year can still generate recruiting momentum. This is the case for Monterey Trail defensive back Jehiel Budgett (6-foot-0, 185 pounds). He has a power/speed blend that was on display on both sides of the ball Friday in a win over Pitman. Offensively,…

It all starts in this space, out of the public eye, athletes pumping iron in a sweat box stashed on the side of the campus gymnasium.  The weight room at Monterey Trail High School offers up all the smells and charm of an old muffler shop, and the sweat that is poured here is a…

For many high school students, juggling class work, homework, and a social life is challenging enough. Mix in playing several sports, maintaining a 4.0 GPA, and jet-setting to several college campuses while being recruited by Division I college football programs, and no one would blame a young athlete if they were overwhelmed.  Yet for Monterey…

The playoffs are here as we finally hit November. The Sac-Joaquin Section football brackets for Divisions I-VII include several teams in these rankings. For the first time since the playoffs started in this section in 1971, there will be first-round byes for the top four seeds, which is good for several reasons.  A good many…