CIF Semi-Finals Lakewood Varsity Football vs Edison

Football has now come to an end for me. This last Saturday night at Orange Coast College Lakewood football played against Edison in the CIF Semi-Finals in front of a full house. The final score was 37-29 Edison.

I need to congratulate these young men for a great played season. After a loss to Crenshaw in our opening pre-season game, Lakewood never looked back by going undefeated through the rest of the season and winning the Moore League Championship, something Poly Football still can't accept.

I've had the honor to capture the seniors of this football team in action throughout their four years at Lakewood High School and have watched them all grow and mature from teenagers into the young men they are now. I have not only watched them grow older through my camera but have watched them grow into great athletes.

These pictures mark the end to their high school football career. For those who are continuing to the next level, I wish you the best in all you do.

Here are a few that I played with. I thought the action used made these stand out and pop.

Long Beach Middle School Boys League Track Meet

Long Beach had their boys middle school league track meet today and I headed out to Lakewood High School to capture the action. Since I covered the long jumpers during the practice meet I started today with the shot putters.

As the practice meet the weather was pretty rough at first. I had dark overcast skies that looked like they wanted to drop buckets of water on us, but the weather held out even allowed the sun to come through a few times later in the morning.

After the shot putters I went to cover the high jumpers.

And what is a track meet without running. I moved to various spots of the track to capture kids I didn't get during the practice meet.

Lakewood Varsity Football vs Bishop Amat

Here we are in the second round of the Pac-5 CIF playoffs. Lakewood started this second round of playoffs with another home game after our win last week against Newport Harbor.

This week found us at home against Bishop Amat, which started as a rough game. At the end of the second half Lakewood found themselves in front of Bishop 13-10. At the start of the second half Bishop came back at Lakewood hard scoring a touchdown early in the third quarter, but that would be the last time Bishop saw the end zone as Lakewood increased their lead to 34-17.

Next week will find Lakewood paired against Edison, location to be announced later. So sit back and enjoy some action from the game.

Long Beach Middle School Boys Practice Track Meet

Long Beach boys middle school track has started with their practice meet this last Saturday. Middle school runs their meets a little different than high school. They will run their field events (shot put / high jump / long jump) first and then their track events. Since there were two high jump areas and two long jump areas I decided to focus on the long jumps, so after capturing all of the athlete's at one pit I moved to the next pit to get them in action. Once I had all of the jumpers I then went to get a few shots of the high jump before the track events started. During their next meet I will get the throwers and all of the high jumpers in action.

At the completion of the field events I then moved on to the track events.

The middle school track meets are held each year at Lakewood High School and during the meets the high school track athletes help with measuring and directing the middle school students. This group of athletes had a great time while working the meet. Thought I'd share a couple of shots of them.

Lakewood Varsity Football vs Newport Harbor

Here we are at the first round of CIF Playoffs, which finds us (Lakewood) at home playing Newport Harbor. I haven't heard much, if anything, about this team and based on the way the first two minutes went neither did Lakewood. Newport Harbor received the opening kickoff and ran it in for a solid touchdown followed by the extra point. Newport then returned the favor by kicking it into the end zone, which had us starting on the 20. First play was a quick toss out to the side, which resulted in a fumble with Newport Harbor regaining possession of the ball. So in a matter of less than two minutes, it was 0-10 Newport Harbor.

Lakewood then stopped Newport's offense on all levels as they started to build up the points. The only other score Newport would see would be in the third quarter with a tipped block pass, which Newport ran in for a touchdown.

Final score was 41-17 Lakewood and puts us into the second round of CIF playoffs. We will be matched against Bishop Amat at home this next Friday.

Here are a few shots to share.