Father and son head football coaches Rick and Sean Curtis finally meet on opposite sides

Crean Lutheran Coach Rick Curtis (left) and his son Capo Valley Coach Sean Curtis swapped shirts and caps after Friday’s scrimmage. (Photo courtesy Crean Lutheran football)

Crean Lutheran High School football coach Rick Curtis used to coach his son Sean when Coach Curtis was the head coach and Sean Curtis was a star receiver at Northwood.

Then, the two teamed up as coaches at two schools.

But Friday evening, father and son were on opposite sides of the field at Crean Lutheran for a scrimmage. Curtis was preparing his Saints for the Thursday, Aug. 19 opener with Ontario Christian at Portola. Sean Curtis, the head coach at Capo Valley, was getting his team ready for a Friday, Aug. 20 opener against Tustin at home.

“It was fun coaching against each other,” Rick Curtis said.”We definitely had the competitive juices flowing. We had never coached against each other before, always working together at Northwood and Santa Margarita. It was also great seeing and going against my former quarterback Dan Selway (now the offensive coordinator at Capo Valley) and Armando Gonzalez, who coached for me at Santa Margarita.

“The staffs are close as our offensive coordinator Russ Oka and our defensive coordinator Justin Dahn coached with Sean and Capo’s offensive line coach Cody Fisher while at JSerra. On top of that, FIsher’s wife Krysten teaches science at Crean Lutheran.”

Rick Curtis said the scrimmage was beneficial for both teams.

“It was a good test for our program and with our staffs having so much respect for each other I am sure we will continue scrimmaging in the future,” he said. “There was great sportsmanship on both sides and we were able to control what each of us wanted to get out of the scrimmage.”

Sean Curtis said on Twitter Friday night, “Pretty cool to be on the opposite side from dad tonight. Even though it was just a scrimmage, we still wanted to beat each other.”

The two Curtis coaches ended the evening by swapping shirts and caps from their schools.

—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com