What’s victory with no honor?

Despite the outcry, the program doubled down on their bad ideas, putting out on social media a photo of the team celebrating their 106-0 win.

This is exactly what high school sports is NOT about. “Pursuing victory with honor” is the catch-phrase on which California Interscholastic Federation hangs its hat.

Inglewood did the exact opposite of that.

People who haven’t even bothered to find out what happened are quick to jump in with their hot takes.

“Well, you don’t want a team to score 100 on you? Stop them.”

“What are they supposed to do? Take a knee?”

These arguments are from clueless people who think high school, college and professional football are all the same. High school football games are rife with mismatches every year, all over the country. I would say a majority of high school coaches are in the game for the right reasons — a firm belief in eduction-based athletics — and would have a modicum of sympathy for an obviously overmatched opponent and would have done all they could to prevent such an outcome.

What could Inglewood have done? For starters, take out the starters. My understanding is they kept the first team in the entire game.

They can have a running clock earlier than the fourth quarter. Reports are James was asked to have a running clock in the second quarter and he refused until finally relenting just before halftime.

Just run the ball to kill the clock. That would have been fine. Instead, Inglewood kept throwing the ball. Even up 84-nothing, they were still winging it all around the field. The Sentinels even went for a 2-point conversion to give them 106 late in the game.

The simple fact of the matter is, Inglewood could have taken all these steps and the final score could have been the same. At least they tried not to run up the score. But the Sentinels did none of these things and they did run up the score.

Next up for Inglewood is the Southern Section playoffs, where the 9-0 Sentinels will take on 9-0 St. Bonaventure of Ventura. I can all but guarantee there will be a lot of Seraph fans this weekend.

***

Closer to home, it was a malfunctioning clock that had Menlo-Atherton coach Chris Saunders a bit frustrated.

Mostly because it was the M-A clock that was having issues during the Bears’ Senior Night win over Burlingame, 34-8, Friday.

I first noticed the clock tripping out during pre-game warmups. The first thing I noticed was the countdown would stop every few seconds and then jump ahead.

But then the clock would revert back to 20, 30 seconds prior, and continue the countdown.

I kind of shrugged my shoulders and got ready for the game.

Once the game started, the clock’s issues did not end. It finally got to the point midway through the first quarter when the officials had to tell Saunders to get the clock in line or time would be kept on the field.

While Saunders is in charge of the M-A football program, I don’t know if that extends to clock issues. As it was being addressed, Saunders turned to the three or four media members and said he had no problem with any of us calling out the clock problem.

The officials finally decided to keep time on the field and the half ended without further delay.

So what happened? One of the officials came running by early in the third quarter to give us an update, as the clock was now functioning properly in the second half. He said the wireless signal between Burlingame’s video camera and the computer used to record its games was interfering with the signal between the clock control board and the scoreboard.

Burlingame’s router (or whatever it was) was relocated, the signals were no longer crossed and the game proceeded.

Nathan Mollat can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: 344-5200 ext. 117. To report scores or have tips, email sports@smdailyjournal.com