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Blue Collar Man Leads Local Football Team to Victory
By
Michael A. Piekarz
Staff Writer
Since
1969, Grant Union High School and 62-year-old Mike Alberghini have
been working together in an unrelenting, aggressive pursuit of excellence.
This year, in the 2008-2009 football season, together they did something that
nobody thought they could do — winning the California State High School
Open Division football championship when most questioned whether or not they
even belonged in a state championship game.
During the regular season and playoffs of this year, Alberghini and the Grant
Union Pacers obliterated nearly every opponent as they rolled on to a 12-0 record.
Despite a clear record of athletic excellence, the team and their coach were
heavy underdogs against Southern California’s Long Beach Poly in the championship
game.
Alberghini had no doubt that his team was capable of winning. He knew the quality
of his players, and he knew they were motivated by the same thing that he was — a
love of the gritty community of Del Paso Heights.
“I think my players are motivated by the perception of their neighborhood
and where we come from,” said Alberghini. “It’s a battle for
respect and a battle to represent the community we love.”
Alberghini and the rest of the Pacer coaches knew the game would be a struggle. “We
knew that it would come down to being willing to pay the price in winning a 12-round
prize fight,” he explained.
Faith in his team was soon justified. The Pacers overcame their opponent, then
ranked Number 2 in the nation and secured the state football title.
Not only did the Pacers win, but they won with style. In an era where winning
at any price seems the rule rather than the exception, the Pacers showed some
class. They knocked down their opponents, then helped them up after the play.
They played their hearts out in an excellent display of competitiveness and sportsmanship.
Alberghini acknowledged that the head coach influences the character of his team,
but he refused to take credit for the sportsmanship displayed by his team.
“It’s due to the athletes and their approach shared as a team,” he
explained.
Alberghini’s own love of athletics was what led him to becoming a teacher,
and since he retired, a highly successful coach at Grant.
“I was a person who so wanted to make a mark in my life by being an athlete,
but it didn’t work out,” he said.
While playing shortstop at California State University Sacramento, Alberghini’s
baseball coach, Cal Boyce, gave him some advice that has served him well.
“He told me that it was great that I loved sports, but you have to get
an education while you’re here,” said Alberghini.
After graduation from Sac State, Alberghini began teaching at Grant and had an
epiphany.
“Coaches were the people, other than my parents, who had the biggest impact
on me,” he explained. “It was the best way to express myself.”
While most widely known as Grant’s head football coach during his tenure
from 1991 until present, Alberghini also served as the school’s baseball
coach, winning 427 games from 1973 through 1991.
Sports have always been the focus for Alberghini, but he has fond memories as
a teacher. “Teaching seemed secondary at first, but as I matured, I grew
to love it as much as sports,” he said. “I got to see new students
every year. It was like going to a new place to work all the time.”
He revels in his role at Grant because it allows him to help others.
“I get to see young people making the same mistakes I did at their age,
and often I can keep it from happening,” Alberghini explained.
While his position as head coach of an iconic Northern California football program
has come with its attendant set of headaches, Alberghini has only one regret.
“I sometimes felt like I wasn’t there for my own children,” he
said somberly. “But my wife made it seem okay.”
He credits wife Mary, his companion of 35 years, for much of his coaching success. “It’s
difficult to be a coach unless you have a wife who can run the family when you
are not there. She allowed me to invest way too much time in something that I
thought was important.”
Alberghini, Grant and Del Paso Heights have benefited from what he thought was
important. The school’s athletic success has become a source of pride for
the community. Many of Alberghini’s former athletes go on to earn college
degrees and often return to serve the school and the community.
“Most of my assistant coaches are ex-players of mine,” said Alberghini. “They
grew up in a tough neighborhood, got an education and came back to help.”
Alberghini is cut from the same cloth as his team and Del Paso Heights.
“These are kids who work hard and earn everything they’ve got,” he
emphatically stated. “If they are the image of blue collar, then I am proud
to be blue collar.”
In January, Mike Alberghini was named the National Coach of the Year by the high
school sports Web site MaxPreps.
This page and its contents ©2009
Metropolitan News Company, Inc.
