We are just one week away from high school football on the Central Coast and like Atascadero and Nipomo did Thursday, the SLO High Tigers made their way north for a scrimmage against Paso Robles High School.
The Tigers are coming off an 8-3 season under head coach Patrick Johnston where they only suffered one loss in the Ocean League.
However, after a tough first round playoff exit to Mission Oak in the first round of the Central Section playoffs, the hope is that this year’s non-conference slate prepares them even more so for league play and the postseason.
“We have two local Mountain League opponents in our non-league, and then we have two Valley opponents in our non-league in Caruthers and North Bakersfield," Johnston explained. "They proved to be a very good testing pre-season for us last year and looking forward to the same thing this year. I think it's a good mix.”
The Tigers begin their 2023 season with the exact same four-game non-league slate as they did in 2022 taking on Nipomo, Caruthers, Arroyo Grande and North Bakersfield in the first four weeks.
The Paso Robles Bearcats are also coming off an intriguing 2022 season where they finished third in an extremely competitive Mountain League before falling in the first round of the playoffs. This season, their difficult non-conference slate in the first two games will help set the stage for what’s to come in league play.
“We managed to not schedule the Raiders of the 49ers, but everybody else," interim head coach, Tim Alvord, said jokingly. " That's a pretty tough schedule so we're going to try and make sure that we we build one week at a time and just try to build our offense and our defense a little bit of time, avoid injuries and make continued progress and hopefully be where we want to be when we get to the to the Mountain League.”
Paso Robles gets their season started next Friday, Aug. 18against Kingsburg before taking on their longtime rival of Atascadero in week 2.
