Mission Viejo High School’s Bob Johnson knows a thing-or-two about win streaks during his 46 years as a head coach. His current version of the Diablos is on a 35-game win streak heading into Friday night’s game against San Juan Hills. The current streak is six games shy of the school record 41-game win streak from 2001 through 2003, which is tied for the 14th best all-time in California.
Earlier this week, I talked (video below) with several of the players about how proud they are of the streak, which includes a 2015 CIF Division I-AA state championship and a 2014 CIF Southern Section West Valley Division title.
The current win streak is tied for the seventh longest active streak in the country. Over the past two championship seasons, Mission Viejo was led by Coach Johnson’s grandson Brock Johnson, who is now at Georgetown.
Related: Mission Viejo ranked #37 in latest Top 50
Related: Mission Viejo #4 in SoCal and California Top 25’s
This year’s offense is averaging 44-points a game under the direction of senior quarterback Matt McDonald, who was Mater Dei‘s starting QB at the beginning of 2015. This season, McDonald has completed over 62-percent of his passes for 1,465 yards with 22 touchdowns and only five interceptions.
Junior receivers Austin Osborne and Olaijah Griffin have caught seventeen of McDonald’s TD tosses with ten and seven respectively. Griffin is the teams leading receiver with 26 catches, averaging 17.9 yards per grab. Osborne is averaging 24.5 yards per grab with 20 catches.
McDonald says all of his receivers have been outstanding this year. He added (video below) that his relationship with Osborne off-the-field has helped with their hook-ups on-the-field.
Osborne has 13 FBS scholarship offers, while Griffin has ten, according to 247Sports.
This year’s offense is well-balanced with 1,573 yards passing through a 7-0 start and 1,286 yards on the ground, led by two-way standout Colin Schooler, who has gained 507 yards, averaging 9.1 yards per carry with ten touchdowns. Schooler is second on the team in tackles from his linebacker position.
Schooler is tough-as-nails and attacks opponents on both side of the ball. I asked him (video below) about his approach to his physical game.
Schooler is definitely being under-recruited in my mind and many others in Orange County. He has offers from smaller FBS schools like Buffalo, Fresno State, Nevada, New Mexico and UNLV. He told me that he takes inspiration from his brother and former teammate Brenden Schooler, who after receiving only an offer from Wyoming, held-out and ended-up signing with Oregon in July.
When will the streak by challenged? Certainly, South Coast League play is always tough with remaining regular season games against San Juan Hills, Trabuco Hills and San Clemente. Then it’s postseason time in the newly-revamped CIF Southern Section with the Diablos part of Division I, which is the old PAC-5 Division, which is considered one of the best in the nation. Mission Viejo has spent several years in the old West Valley Division, which is now Division II.
Related: CIF Southern Section moves to competitive equity for playoffs
