What a Swell Finish to the High School Sports Season

The local high school sports year ended Saturday with a roar.

Not from the stands, but from the, um, field.

“We’re just like the football team,” said Andy Verdone, Huntington Beach High surf coach. “Except we do it in the ocean.”

The local high school sports year ended at Salt Creek Beach in Dana Point Saturday with the National Scholastic Surfing Assn. high school championships, and, by now, the question is rising from your mouth like a skyscraper swell.

There are high school surf teams?

“Yeah,” said Colleen Mehlberg of San Clemente High. “And it’s pretty rad.”

A dozen surf teams were competing for the national title, all but two of them from Southern California, where surf squads dot the coastline like funky taco stands.

“Some of my friends from other places are like, ‘You’re on the what?’ ” said Max McIlwee of San Clemente. “They’re like, ‘Dude, during our P.E. classes, we have to run around tracks.’ ”

It’s eccentric, it’s engaging, it’s a great way to end the local prep season, hanging out with this typical Southland innovation, kids who can earn high school credits with a wetsuit and a leash, competing on a team with cheerleaders and ...

Wait. Rule No. 1. No cheerleaders.

“We’re our own cheerleaders, dude,” said Chris Waring of Huntington Beach.

Rule No. 2. No marching bands, except when a San Clemente pep band annually trudges across the sand to psych out rival Huntington Beach.

Those two schools are the Red Sox and Yankees of high school surfing. San Clemente has won six national titles, Huntington Beach 17.

“That band was the raddest thing ever,” said Mehlberg.

Rule No. 3. No team uniforms.

The surfers instead don colored shirts over their wetsuits so the judges can tell them apart.

There’s also no scoreboard.

And if somebody doesn’t bring doughnuts, there is no food or drink.

Of course, that last part doesn’t much matter because there’s also almost zero fans. The meetings occur weekdays at 7 a.m. on various home beaches.

Wait. Another rule. They’re not called home beaches, they are called home breaks.

“On our home break, when the waters gets warm, we get a lot of sting ray bites,” said Verdone, and when is the last time you’ve heard a coach say that?

Then there was the time Huntington Beach gained an edge when a competitor was chased out of the water by a seal.

Which is still better than the fate of those high school kids who, during practice, engage in underwater fights with the locals who don’t want to give up their waves.

Hoosiers, this ain’t.

“This is a whole different world,” said McIlwee, who spent his final prep days as a typical school surf jock.

Football players, you’re not going to want to hear this.

His first three periods were all, essentially, surf classes, including a surf P.E. session and a surf-team session.

He dried off at mid-morning to attend two more classes down the road at school, and was finished in the early afternoon.

“Pretty much the perfect schedule,” he said with a smile.

Which brings up something else that football players really don’t want to hear.

High school surf teams have the highest-paid prep athletes in town, some benefiting from more than $100,000 a year in endorsement items that include new cars.

Waring, who graduated last week and will join the pro tour, has long had sponsors for his clothing, his board, his leash, his car, his sunglasses and his shoes.

While most top prep basketball stars who are turning pro at least go through the motions of preparing for college, not the surfers.

Waring didn’t even take the SAT or ACT exams.

“I know where my future lies,” he said.

The endorsement deals are one reason surfing is not a recognized sport by the CIF. Another reason is that the ocean is not easily accessible to the group’s general membership, so there are not enough teams.

And sometimes, the team’s rosters are as murky as the water. The surfing rules are so flexible there were top surfers competing for high school teams Saturday that didn’t even attend that school, but were, instead, home-schooled.

“I don’t think that’s right,” said Bill Hartman, longtime and retiring San Clemente coach. “I feel you should have to do seat time in order to surf.”

Regulation would be difficult. But the CIF should look at the results.

On Saturday, in this most individual of sports, there were kids putting down their boards and cheering for other kids.

There were kids putting down their boards to walk other kids into the water while giving pep talks.

There were kids of both genders -- boys and girls compete on the same team -- cheering for one another as in no other sport.

Because the scoring was so painstaking to figure, and because final results aren’t announced until next week’s national banquet here, it didn’t feel like it was about the points.

“It’s about these kids realizing that life is about teamwork,” said Verdone. “They are all used to being individuals. By having a team, it teaches them there is something more.”

Rising from her spot on the surf-team bench -- a towel -- Mehlberg smiled.

“The rule is, a friend on the beach is not a friend in the water,” she said. “But not here, because here, you get your waves, then you get your teammates waves.”

In front of her, other members of the San Clemente High Tritons exchanged soggy and sandy hugs.

Behind her, the roar.

*

Bill Plaschke can be reached at [email protected]. To read previous columns by Plaschke, go to latimes.com/plaschke.