A Little Giant

Many high schools go years without playing a football game in December, when only the best teams are left in the playoffs.

Then there is Ventura St. Bonaventure, which seems to make nearly as many December appearances as that guy with the white beard and red suit.

The Seraphs’ 34-3 semifinal victory over Agoura on Friday night kept alive their pursuit of a fifth consecutive Southern Section title. In the final, they will meet the winner of tonight’s game between Moorpark and Westlake Village Westlake in what will be their sixth championship game appearance in eight years. They have won 68 of their last 69 games, including 19 in a row in the playoffs.

The small Catholic school has built a dynasty in the backyard of larger public schools, though not without raising suspicions of impropriety among rival coaches.

Jon Mack, in his 14th season as St. Bonaventure’s football coach, is familiar with the rumors. Seated in his office, a smiling Mack ticked off a list of his supposedly nefarious recruiting tactics.

“I’ve heard that I go to [athletes’] houses and I have scholarship papers in my pocket, and I give them $1,000 bills,� he said. “That they have access to school vehicles, and they get their lunches paid for. It’s crazy.�

Mack expected he would be scrutinized after St. Bonaventure started its run of success in the mid-1990s. At the time, he said people would either try to emulate his program or they would try to tear it down.

After constructing winning streaks of 43 and, currently, 25 games -- the longest in Ventura County history -- it’s apparent that Mack’s program was built to last.

“Ever since he came on the scene, the football program has been a tremendous success,� said Brother Paul Horkan, St. Bonaventure’s longtime principal. “It has given the school a lot of publicity. It has impacted enrollment. It’s not necessarily all because of football, but it hasn’t hurt.�

Indeed, evidence of the football team’s success isn’t limited to the school trophy case. In Mack’s first year, enrollment was 550. Now it’s 750, including about 150 football players. The coach is also credited with helping to raise more than $2 million that was used to build administration offices, add an entrance to the gymnasium and expand the weightroom in the last few years.

On the field, Mack rates this season among his most gratifying because the team does not have a superstar player. Gone were receiver/running back Whitney Lewis, a freshman at USC, and running back Lorenzo Booker, who graduated in 2002 and plays for Florida State.

Since he took over the program in 1990, Mack has assigned a song to each of his St. Bonaventure teams during preseason training camp. This year’s was the sledgehammer rock of AC/DC’s “Back In Black.�

“Before the season began, a lot of people were writing us off,� Mack said. “People told us, ‘All your superstars graduated. The reign of terror is over.’ We wanted to send a message: ‘Hey, we’re back.’ �

The Seraphs (13-0) proved they were still a formidable team by beating highly rated Newhall Hart in nonleague play and by mowing down the competition in the Channel League en route to an eighth consecutive league title. (The victory over Hart avenged a loss last season that ended the Seraphs’ winning streak at 43 games.)

“Other people doubting you just makes you work that much harder to prove them wrong,� said Terrail Lambert, a senior cornerback. “That’s what happened with this team.�

A jump in competition from Division XI to Division IV last year was supposed to level the playing field for St. Bonaventure, which had a 42-0 record in its last three seasons in Division XI. It hasn’t happened. The Seraphs have won all 10 of their Channel League games the last two seasons.

“It was frustrating because we thought we were going to be pretty good,� said Rick Scott, who recently resigned after 16 years as coach at Channel League rival Buena. “[St. Bonaventure] just had too many weapons. It’s like playing an all-star team.�

Scott, a critic of players switching schools for athletic reasons, said a handful of Buena players had transferred to St. Bonaventure during his tenure. He also said some junior high players destined for Buena ended up at St. Bonaventure, creating hard feelings.

“It makes it tough when you’re playing against players that should be on your team,� Scott said. “There is some resentment caused by that.�

A few years ago, a Ventura County coach labeled the school “St. Oxnard� because of the many Seraph players from that area.

Many agree that Booker’s transfer from Oxnard High during his freshman year in 1998 was a turning point. Before then, St. Bonaventure had very few black players. After Booker’s arrival, several others, nearly all of them football players from the Oxnard area, enrolled at St. Bonaventure.

Ever since, Scott said, the Seraphs have been “like a snowball rolling downhill.�

Mack acknowledged that getting Booker, who set a state career record with 131 rushing touchdowns, was a watershed moment for his program. Mack denied rumors that Booker was recruited, saying he was contacted by the player’s brother after a dispute arose involving the family and the Oxnard school district.

Booker’s success on the field and in the classroom -- he scored 1,000 on the SAT and had a good enough grade-point average to have his pick of any major college in the nation -- carried a lot of weight in the player’s neighborhood, Mack said.

Lewis, who had been a standout youth player in Oxnard, enrolled at St. Bonaventure as a freshman a year after Booker. Lewis was the recipient of The Times’ Glenn Davis Award last season as the Southland’s top high school player.

This year’s team features several key players from Oxnard, including Lambert and running back Matt Lee, a junior who leads the Seraphs with 2,021 yards rushing and 35 touchdowns and is Booker’s cousin.

Lee rushed for 176 yards and three touchdowns Friday night against Agoura (11-2).

“He had a big influence on me coming here,� Lee said of Booker. “I originally wanted to go to Oxnard or Hueneme.�

About one-third of the students at St. Bonaventure receive financial aid based on need to help pay the $5,000-a-year tuition. About a dozen are members of the football team, Principal Horkan said.

Mack’s commitment to his players runs deep. He’ll go to great lengths to get them noticed by recruiters, and his enthusiasm has helped more than 15 St. Bonaventure athletes receive college scholarships in the last five years. Lambert, whose list of prospective colleges includes USC, Florida State, Notre Dame and Ohio State, and offensive lineman Eric Rouser (6 feet 8, 275 pounds) will soon join that list.

It wasn’t always this way. When Mack came to St. Bonaventure after bouncing around for several years as a football assistant and head track coach at Sherman Oaks Notre Dame, Mission Hills Alemany and Los Angeles Loyola, he inherited a program that had won only two league titles in more than 20 years.

“It was not in great shape,� he said. “The numbers were down. Interest was down. Kids weren’t playing football because it wasn’t fun.�

He assigned his first team the Isley Brothers’ song “Shout� because he wanted to “spread the word that football was fun.� It soon was.

Although the 1990 team finished 2-7, the players set the foundation for the next season, when the Seraphs went 8-5, won the Tri-Valley League title and upset top-ranked Big Bear in a Division IX quarterfinal.

“It was a great step, but it almost happened too quickly, too easily,� Mack said. “We forgot all the work that we had done.�

Three consecutive losing seasons followed before an 8-4 record in 1995 started a run of nine consecutive winning seasons. The Seraphs won the Division X title in 1996 with a team led by quarterback Teohua Sanchez and receiver Pepe Villasenor, now both assistant coaches at their alma mater.

The program’s winning tradition has attracted athletes such as senior quarterback Brian Stevens, who lives in Camarillo and would have attended Oxnard Rio Mesa if he had not chosen to attend a private school.

“I had a lot of friends who were coming here,� said Stevens, who completed 16 of 24 passes for 142 yards and a touchdown against Agoura. “I came over here a couple of times and liked what I saw. Everyone wants a piece of a championship.�

That includes Mack, who considered offers to become a college assistant after last season before realizing that his heart was at St. Bonaventure, where his wife Kathy is a teacher and his daughter Jenny, a junior, plays on the volleyball team.

“I really thought hard about leaving,� Mack said. “I kind of felt, ‘What do I have left to accomplish?’ But I’m so glad I came back for this team because it’s been a very rewarding year.�

Whenever Mack does decide to leave St. Bonaventure, one thing is certain. His successor will have a tough act to follow.