There’s no shortage of intrigue when the Edison and Fountain Valley High football teams meet Friday night at Cal State Fullerton, in what promises to be a “Battle for the Bell” for the ages.
Both teams are 8-0, 3-0 in league. The winner of the rivalry game in its 41st year takes sole possession of first place in the Sunset League, with one game left in the regular season.
Fountain Valley is also looking to win the bell back for the first time since 2004, so there’s that aspect as well.
But sitting in Coach John Shipp’s office on Tuesday afternoon, with senior quarterback/free safety Dominic Ragland and senior tailback Kyle Middlebrooks on either side of him, senior lineman Anthony Vega also thinks of another.
He remembers 2006, when the Barons freshman team went 9-1. Guess who served the Barons their only loss that year? Edison.
“We didn’t expect [this year] to be like this, but we wanted to be good and we wanted to win,” Vega said. “We’ve thought back to our freshman year when we were 9-1 and lost to Edison. We want to get them back and make it perfect, make it 10-0.”
Middlebrooks has already rushed for 1,347 yards this year behind a big offensive line that includes left tackle Sese Ianu (6 feet, 224 pounds), left guard Irving Muñoz (6-0, 230), center Brandon Moss (6-2, 260), right guard Vega (6-3, 275) and right tackle Courtland Drummond (6-1, 224). He remembers that freshman year team, too.
“It’s pretty much the same team, with all their star players and all our star players,” said Middlebrooks, who is close family friends with Edison senior running back/defensive back Wade Houston. “We’ve been playing since freshman year, so it’s cool We know all the players. Wade is like my cousin. He comes to all the family events and everything. We have our little beef here and there, but it’s cool, though. It just hypes it up that much more.”
Yet, despite the two undefeated records thus far, make no mistake that Fountain Valley will be the underdog Friday night. Edison is the top-ranked team in the CIF Southern Section Pac-5 Division poll, the team going for at least a share of its fourth straight Sunset League title. But not counting last year, when five teams shared the title with a 3-2 league record, Fountain Valley has won a title just once (2003) since 1996.
