VALENCIA

Continued from 36 mer in the weight room leading to a number of players making huge physical strides. The Vikings are two years past winning a CIF title and four years without a Foothill League championship but are ready to erase both of those streaks. power to try to accomplish what their buddies on the baseball team did.

“Our whole defense is full of guys that are bigger dudes that just want to get at it together,” Farrell said. “That’s what we needed as a team… It just shows when you walk in the field and when the team’s close, they walk on the field like they own it.

“As a D-line we just want the basic torment of opposing quarterbacks,” Gradoville said. “But as a team, personally, I want to go to playoffs and I want to win CIF in my senior season just like our baseball team did. Playoffs are a big goal for the whole team of course.”

Last year is well behind the team and Gibson feels better than ever about getting another shot at Foothill League teams.

“I guess our main goal right now is just to be prepared for what’s coming for us because you never know,” Gibson said. “Everyone says that they have a game plan until they get punched in the face. So, I guess our game plan is to be prepared to be punched in the face. We have to be ready to take a hit but not to give up. We just have to get back up and keep fighting.”

Castaic will run it back with the exact same schedule as last season, in the same order too.

The team will open up at Adelanto, a game that was eventually awarded a victory to Castaic due to

That’s the difference. My sophomore year going into playoffs, that team just owned it when they walked on the field. And this year, it’s gonna be something even better than that.”

A 5-5 regular season could be considered solid for a lot of football programs. However, the Vikings are ready to leave 2022 behind.

“Last year was rough. We have to grow and learn from it,” Muir said. “I think the guys have to mature. Last year, we were close on a lot of things and I think we were always just close and were just kind of missing it. That’s where we got to push it and get that past us. That’s

CIF rule violations leading to a forfeit. The Coyotes then take on Royal and Burbank, two teams that Castaic put 20 points on last year in losses. Castaic will also host Eastside, the only team they beat last season.

The Coyotes have a solid chance of improving as a program and taking some big strides this season. The team will aim to win its first home game, league game and maybe even playoff game.

Either way, Shakir and the group are excited to retake the field. Castaic will battle week in and week out regardless of the score to help build a positive culture for the young program.

“I love these guys. These are good kids and they have really bought in,” Shakir said. “They’re working real hard. They understand the expectations and they’re trying to do whatever they can live up to those right now. Rule No. 1 was changing the culture and I think we’ve kind of done that but we still have work to do. Everything else is just brick by brick as they say.” 

got to be the mission.”

The room feels different this season, with all Vikings feeling a change of energy.

“With our aggressiveness, it was kind of embarrassing watching us last year looking like we didn’t want to be there,” Pikor said. “The energy is there this year. The kids on the team want to play football. We want to be here … Every time we had alumni come practice, and talk about older teams, they said something about their team and I couldn’t relate to it. But this year I relate to it. Valencia football is back.” 

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