Seniors Michael Bertolino, right, and Koki Arai embrace as they celebrate their victory against Pleasant Grove High School during the Div. I section championship Saturday, Dec. 3.

The football left the hand of senior Granite Bay High School quarterback Brendan Keeney and arched through the clear, cold sky under the watchful stare of thousands of fans at Sacramento State University.

The ball seemed to hang in midair, leaving the feeling that the entire season could be hanging on the outcome of this one play, called “Back Pass Right Y Dancer.”

GBHS had gone up 10-0 in the early stages of the Sac-Joaquin Section Div. I championship, but the Pleasant Grove Eagles had come back with a touchdown and field goal to tie the game.

With less than a minute left in the half, this play was the best chance for GBHS to go into the locker room with a lead. It felt crucial for the Grizzlies to rebuild some momentum against an opponent that was not only the favorite to win the section championship game but had begun the season ranked in the top 10 nationally.

As the ball finally floated back toward the ground, it settled into the outstretched hands of senior tight end Spencer Briare.

Touchdown.

That completion restored the momentum, and the Grizzlies went on to win 30-24, collecting the team’s first-ever Division I section title.

Hanging in the Granite Bay High weight room is a sign that reads, “The most important ability is dependability,” and that was the key for the big victory at the end of a big season. No matter what happened, the players stood together and pushed through.

***

The game started rather slowly, but it picked up pace when Granite Bay went up 10-0. Without too many problems, however, the Pleasant Grove offense stormed down the field twice and tied the game.

After the Grizzlies seized the momentum on the Keeney-Briare touchdown at the end of the half, Pleasant Grove started the second half with a touchdown of its own.

The Granite Bay defense came off the field frustrated and angry. A couple of players banged their helmets against the metal bench, setting off what sounded like an angry chorus.

Granite Bay could have wilted. Pleasant Grove had an offense that beat up teams all season and averaged more than 54 points a game. The Eagles were not only favored to beat Granite Bay but had begun the year ranked No. 8 in the country. Besides, Pleasant Grove was led by Arik Armstead, all 6-foot-7 and 285 pounds of him. Armstead is being recruited by just about every major college in the country and is considered by some to be the top line prospect in the nation.

The Grizzlies had to battle nagging injuries and other challenges, but when the GBHS players came off the field, they quickly insisted they were OK and got back in the game. Senior offensive guard Colton Sviba, who had a stomach flu leading up to the game, left the game once to throw up but returned after a couple of plays.

The Grizzlies pulled ahead again, only to have Pleasant Grove tie the game at 24 in the fourth quarter.
Pulling together yet again, the Grizzlies mounted an 11-play, 80-yard drive that ended when senior running back Arik Bird rushed into the end zone for a touchdown.

But then the extra point was blocked. A Pleasant Grove touchdown and extra point would win the game.
Bird threw down his water bottle on the sideline without realizing the lid wasn’t screwed on all the way. Water spurted everywhere.

With a little less than three minutes left in the game, Pleasant Grove got the ball. The Eagles, an offensive force, had yet another chance.

Grizzly defensive coordinator Tim Harrington told the defense to “turn the page, dig deep, find a way to get a stop. You got to believe.”

And believe they did. With the rest of the team watching in desperation, willing a stop with their eyes, junior linebacker Beau Hershberger stripped the Pleasant Grove quarterback of the ball, and Briare came up with it.

Briare credited Hershberger for the huge play and said he was just glad to be in the right place at the right time.

“The section championship is like the Super Bowl for high school football,” Briare said, “so I knew I had to step up, and I knew I had to make some big plays, and that’s what happened.”

The Grizzlies took a knee to end the season with a championship, and Keeney did a Lambeau Leap into the outstretched arms of the Tribe. Michael Bertolino, Austin Paulhus, Ian Mook, Beau Hershberger and Adam Wagner stood together on a sideline bench as fans chanted “Granite Bay! Granite Bay! Granite Bay!”

Someone tossed confetti into the air on that blustery day, and the smiles on the faces of the players were a million miles wide.

Senior Gavin Andrews, who plays both ways on the line, picked up anyone and everyone he could find and enveloped him in a hug. Coach Ernie Cooper briefly shared a special moment with seniors Keeney and Andrews, the only three-year starters on the team. Cooper then ran off to hug and congratulate the rest of his players.

“I just found (Keeney) and (Andrews) and asked them if all the hard work they put into the sport was worth it,” Cooper said. “They’ve been through the ringer with me for three years and were a huge part of the win.”

Cooper then said how proud he was of his team and how, even though they weren’t the most talented bunch he’s coached, they still pulled through and brought home a section banner.

“They’re a really special group,” Cooper said. “They had a great bond, and the guys really came together.”
Andrews is 6-foot-6 and 320 pounds and has committed to play football at Oregon State University. He heard all about his match-up with Pleasant Grove’s all-everything Armstead in the days leading up to the game, but he said he just wanted to live up to the offensive line’s motto: “Get nasty.”

“Coming into the game, I knew I was going to have to be my best against the best,” Andrews said. “We just all went 100 percent on him, and it paid off. We just had to make every play count. This was three years in the making.”

Keeney said: “It was a battle. It’s just such an amazing feeling to win a section championship.”

Keeney said he wouldn’t be where he is right now without Cooper and the rest of the team.

“(My teammates) mean everything in the world to me,” Keeney said. “We played well and got things done.”
Senior free safety Alec Naki said the team was excited coming into the game, especially after being labeled the underdogs, or “undergrizzlies,” as he put it.

“It was a team effort,” Naki said. “This team has heart. Words can’t even describe how much they all mean to me; I have 70 new brothers.”

The season as a whole mirrored that final game – plenty of setbacks but a perseverance that won out in the end.

Playing a brutal schedule, the Grizzlies lost on the road early in the year to Vacaville, a team that eventually won the Div. II section title. Granite Bay then put together a string of wins but lost a close one, again on the road, to Del Oro, the eventual Div. III champions.

Granite Bay entered the playoffs as just the No. 5 seed. They beat 12th-seeded Napa 31-7 and moved on to face 13th-seeded Oak Ridge.

On the third play of that game, Keeney went out with an injury. Backup quarterback junior Grant Caraway couldn’t throw because of an injury. Vinny Esposito, the junior varsity quarterback, missed two days of school with an illness that week and couldn’t play. That left the Grizzlies with the 5-foot-5, 135-pound JV backup Josh Neal.

It was easy to tell he didn’t fit in, because his JV uniform didn’t match those of the varsity players.

But a little thing like playing with their fourth-string quarterback wasn’t going to stop these Grizzlies.

Oak Ridge put a lot of pressure on the defense, but it responded with interceptions and other big plays. Neal made a few big plays himself, and, somehow, Granite Bay won the game 21-12.

The next challenge was Lincoln of Stockton, the top seed and a truly dangerous team. Granite Bay eked out a lead and just tried to hold on.

With GBHS ahead 28-21, and the Grizzlies needing a goal line stand to end the game, Cooper couldn’t watch. He took a knee and turned his back to the field. He knew the crowd would tell him what happened.
The silence turned to cheers, and Cooper knew his team had come through with an epic defensive stand. The Grizzlies had made the section final.

“It was all worth it,” senior defensive lineman Austin Paulhus said. “This win means everything to us.”

Senior wide receiver Adam Wagner said it was bittersweet, knowing he had played his last game in a Granite Bay uniform.

“This was the seniors’ fourth year together,” Wagner said. “Every year, we wanted to be champions, and now we are. This team is just a family. We’ve been through so much.”

2001 graduate Noah Frank, who has been at the games all season cheering the team on, said he always believed in them.

“They have been working hard and have enthusiasm,” Frank said. “I’m very proud of them.”

The legacy of great Granite Bay football will live on. On the sidelines during the section championship game were water boys who are playing for the Junior Grizzlies youth teams, just like Keeney, Briare, Wagner and others had done before them.

That’s going to be us someday,” one of the water boys whispered to a friend during the game. “We’re going to be just like them.”

Being the backbone of any school’s personality, a mascot is what produces school spirit, motivates sports teams and ultimately affects the way people view the school.

So what do the students here at GBHS think of the ever-so-humble grizzly that belongs to our school?
Most of the students here would agree that this beast of an animal does an accurate job at reflecting our school’s character.

“I think the grizzly is a great animal to reflect GBHS’ sports life,” sophomore Michael Geraghty said. “It shows we are very fierce and want to win, and as you can see from our tribe, we love to cheer like the wild grizzlies that we are. Plus it has the same logo as California, which is cool because that’s where we live.”

The competitive edge that the grizzly bear has in the wild is also reflective of out athletic performance over other schools.

“Being the grizzlies means that we’re fierce mammals,” sophomore Marc Ellis said. “They’re at the top of the food chain, just like us as a school, plus they are very intimidating.”

The fact is, a school’s mascot is a major factor in stimulating a school’s spirit, a competitive quality that GBHS seems to have quite a lot of recently.

“Regardless of the occasion,” Geraghty said. “If it’s a school sports event, I’m always down to unleash my inner Grizzly. If we were any other animal, I wouldn’t get nearly as fired up.”
That is the purpose of a mascot after all, to inspire school spirit and get students excited about school events.
“A good mascot has to really fire you up,” sophomore Owen McNiff said. “You have to want to be that mascot. You have to feel it, and the grizzly makes me do that.”

Without the Grizzly, some students would venture to say that we would lose a lot of our drive, that the spirit which pushes our sports teams to victory just wouldn’t be there.

“Mascots are 100% important. It’s … the symbol of our school, and it’s the life and breath of our spirit,”
Geraghty said. “I really don’t think we would be as aggressive if we didn’t have the mascot we do.”

Not only does the mascot get students more excited about school events, it also helps athletes perform at their best by increasing crowd support.

“I was in the grizzly bear mascot costume on Sports-A-Rama night,” sophomore Jackson Rodriguez said. “I definitely would say that the way people get fired up over the mascot makes the people in the event try harder.”

Lots of Granite Bay High sports fans even think that the effect of the grizzly goes beyond that of a conventional mascot.

“It’s more of a community rather than just an animal,” sophomore Owen McNiff said. “I feel like everyone who cheers for Granite Bay is part of an association of people who are automatically friends with one another. Like a secret clan of GBHS fans.”

Although most students are proud to be a part of the grizzly community, some still see room for improvement when it comes to our mascot.

“I’m happy being the Grizzlies, but if I could be any mascot, I would definitely be the dolphins,” Marc Ellis said. “They are … as dominant as grizzlies, only they live in water and are way smarter.”

Mascots are generally either ‘hit or miss’ when it comes to selecting a good one. Although we seem to be on the lucky side, some other local schools’ aren’t as popular as our grizzly.

“The Rocklin Thunder is literally the saddest excuse for a mascot I’ve ever heard of,” Ellis said. “How are you supposed to get intimidated by a mascot that isn’t even tangible? It’s a sound, and it’s not even dangerous.”

Ellis isn’t the only GBHS student to find some local schools’ mascots to be uninspiring.

“The Del Oro eagles are pretty lame,” McNiff said. “What are you going to do, fly all over me?”

Overall, the students and surrounding community of Granite Bay are, for the most part, happy to be considered Grizzlies, and wouldn’t settle for anything less when it comes to what represents our school.

“Having the grizzly as our mascot makes it easy to have pride in our school,” said Ellis, “How can’t you when you have such a powerful animal.”

   Granite Bay (12-2) won its fourth section title since 1999, but its first in Division One.

   Granite Bay’s offense was impressive all day against Pleasant Grove, which began the season ranked No. 8 in the nation. The Grizzlies only had to punt once. All other possessions ended in a score—four touchdowns and one field goal.

   The Grizzlies mounted an impressive drive with little time left in the first half, to go into halftime ahead.

   Granite Bay also converted on a fourth and 11 in the middle of the second half on what was probably the play of the game. Quarterback Brendan Keeney, under heavy pressure, hit Tight End Spencer Briare over the middle with a short pass, but Briare was tangled up with a defender and hadn’t yet turned to look for the pass. The ball hit him in the chest, and he reflexively caught the ball without ever really seeing it. The defender hit him a moment later, but he held on to the ball as he fell forward for the first down.

   The defense for Granite Bay then sealed the deal late in the game by sacking the Pleasant Grove quarterback, knocking the ball loose and recovering the fumble.

   In front of a crowd that was heavily in favor of Granite Bay, the team began by taking the opening kickoff and driving for a touchdown.

    After stopping Pleasant Grove, Granite Bay added a field goal early in the second quarter.

   Pleasant Grove then put together a long drive, but Granite Bay held, and Pleasant Grove kicked a short field goal to make the score 10-3.

   The next Granite Bay drive ended in its one punt of the day, and Pleasant Grove then struck quickly. On a third-and-four on its own side of the field, with Granite Bay defending the short pass, Pleasant Grove instead went long and had a receiver wide open for a touchdown.

   This was when Granite Bay mounted a quick drive and scored right before the half, taking a 17-10 lead into the locker room.

   Pleasant Grove put together a sustained drive for a touchdown after taking the second-half kickoff but had its extra point blocked.

   The Grizzlies scored on its next possession after the Keeney-Briare connection deep in Pleasant Grove territory on fourth down; That touchdown and extra point made the score 24-16.

   Another Pleasant Grove drive and touchdown was followed by a two-point conversion, so the game was tied as Granite Bay got the ball again well into the fourth quarter.

    Keeney and the rest of the offense which didn’t have a turnover all day despite heavy winds, never faltered. The team drove steadily downfield and scored a touchdown with six minutes to go.

    This time, it was Granite Bay’s turn to have an extra point blocked, so the Grizzlies were only up by six as Pleasant Grove got the ball back.

   As the team neared midfield, though, the Granite Bay defense flushed the quarterback out of the pocket. As he tried to scramble, the ball was knocked out of his hand from behind, and Briare, playing linebacker, recovered.

   There was still 2 ½ minutes on the clock, and Pleasant Grove still had all its time outs, so Granite Bay needed two or three first downs to run out the clock. That turned out to be no problem. Granite Bay, which had been mixing runs and passes all day, pounded the ball through the middle of the Pleasant Grove defense.

   The game ended with Granite Bay taking a knee twice on about the 10-yard line of Pleasant Grove.

   In addition to Keeney and Briare, Arik Bird was a force at running back, and Adam Wagner made several crucial catches for first downs. Gavin Andrews and the rest of the offensive line had an exceptional day, even though they were up against Arik Armstead, a defensive lineman who is 6’8” tall and weighs 295 pounds and is being recruited by the top colleges in the country. By the end of the game, Armstead was watching from the sideline.

   On the defensive side, in addition to Briare, Andrews had an exceptional game. He knocked down two passes and dominated on the defensive line.  

   Keeney completed 13 of 19 passes for 136 yards and two touchdowns.

   Bird rushed for 166 yards on 27 carries and scored Granite Bay’s other two touchdowns.

   “We have a very proud tradition of football here at Granite Bay,” Briare said, “and it’s awesome just to be a part of it.”

Sophomore Tony Ellison stands in anticipation of the play with his fellow Grizzly football players at the Homecoming game vs. Rocklin Thunder on October 28

Sophomores are so rare on the varsity football team that neither of the Granite Bay High School alumi currently playing in the NFL were chosen to play varsity football as a sophomore. Yet sophomore Tony Ellison was brought up to be a flyback for varsity football.

“Some people are just born with talent. Ellison is one of those people,” defensive backs coach Mike Valentine said.

“I was blessed with great skill and speed and I work really hard at what I do,” Ellison said.

He has helped the team out significantly by providing four touchdowns this year via receptions or rushes.

“He is a key asset to our team because of his speed and instincts,” GBHS junior Zak Lilley said.

His speed is something that he provides as both a flyback and a kick returner.

“He is one of the fastest if not the fastest player on our team,” Valentine said.

Ellison excelled at the freshman football level and, according to Valentine, was brought up to varsity because of the injury-prone flybacks and his sheer talent.

“I always dreamed of being brought up to varsity as a sophomore, but I never though it would happen.” Ellison said.

While Ellison is an amazing football player, he is not the only player to be brought up as a sophomore the past couple years.

“We brought up Keeny and Andrews two years ago and they started,” Valentine said. “But last year we brought up Calton and Partridge and neither of them started.”

There seems to be a trend in bringing up sophomores to the varsity team in recent years.

“I am all for bringing up sophomores as long as they actually play like Ellison is,” Valentine said.

Ellison realizes how special it is to be on the varsity team and the pressure that comes with it.

“I feel really honored, and I am not being arrogant about it,” Ellison said.

He agrees that bringing up younger players can be both good and bad.

“(Having sophomore starters) can be good unless they let it get to their head and stop working,” Ellison said.

Ellison is also playing basketball and running track for GBHS this year in order to stay in shape and get better.

“We know he has wheels but when track season comes along and we put him next to people like (Grant High School sprinter) Shaq Thompson, we will see exactly how good those wheels are,” Valentine said.

“I play basketball to keep focused, stay in shape, and build leadership,” Ellison said.

But nobody is questioning his ability on the football field.

“He is a great athlete and can keep up with the best of our players,” Lilley said.

However, some of the older players were not so accepting.

“Some of the older players were angry at me for taking some of their plays, but I feel like I have earned their respect through my playing,” Ellison said.

“It all depends on if you are a team player for what is best for the team, or you want the glory for yourself,” Valentine said.

Ellison wants to play football at a high level as he continues his career.

“My dream is to play football in college,” Ellison said.

Both coaches and players agree with the level of talent that Ellison has.

“He is one of the hardest players on our team to cover and stop,” Lilley said.

“You can’t deny the ability that Ellison has as a football player,” Valentine said. “He was just born with amazing wheels”.

Valentine and Ellison’s teammates hold him in high regard as an athlete and are proud of the level of play he has achieved as a sophomore.

“He is one of the best athletes in the school throughout any sport,” Valentine said.

Senior Hailey Israel holds one of three jobs at Cookie Connection in Roseville.

Every student knows how high school is supposed to work: freshman, sophomore and junior year slowly build up the workload and, consequently, the stress.

But once the last year of high school arrives and rigorous course work has already been completed in the first three years, seniors are as good as done. At least that is what many students think.

Senior year is actually the most important time to impress colleges.

Granite Bay High School principal Michael McGuire created a questionnaire for College and Career Center speakers and admissions counselors to answer this year. Originally, the questionnaires were created to help McGuire determine if the Standardized Testing and Reporting grade bump incentives given last year affected college admission decisions.

Not only did he discover that colleges did not mind the grade bumps that students received, but McGuire learned from the sources themselves what colleges are looking for.

After an estimated 10 to 15 speakers and admissions counselors answered the questionnaire, the answer were unanimous-every college is looking for students who have the holistic package.

Not only must seniors be well-rounded, but, according to the questionnaires, a student’s senior year is one of the most essential elements that colleges look at.

“Any senior who is seeking to go to a (top tier) four-year university, who has senioritis, or who skates through their senior year is not going to get in (to college),” McGuire said.

According to McGuire, state university may be just as demanding as private universities.

State schools may have lower expectations, however, the recent competitiveness should be a cause for alarm among students who are planning to attend a public university.

Although he warns students not to take easy classes during senior year, McGuire recognizes that not a majority of the students take what he considers a year off.

“The fact of the matter is that the seniors who are very much interested in going to a top tier-one university are not taking skate course in their senior year,” McGuire said.

“They are taking the most rigorous courses that we offer in their senior year.”

Senior year may be commonly looked at, however, admissions counselors look at academics from all four years of high school.

Like freshman year, senior year is an indicator to admissions counselors that students have motivation throughout high school, whether with easier course work in their freshman year or a challenging schedule in their senior year.

Because being admitted into colleges has become more competitive and admissions counselors want to see their potential students step up to the plate in a year in which many seniors dismiss.

Although colleges are not able to see seniors’ grades throughout their whole last year of high school, Trevor Oftedal, admission counselor for Westmont College in Santa Barbra, said that all colleges keep track of their admitted students when students send in their final transcripts.

“(Westmont) notices, that if students don’t follow through (with hard classes) senior year, that they probably won’t do well in college because college is all about following through and working hard,” Oftedal said.

Oftedal admits that even if prospective students apply for Early Action, an early admissions process, Westmont College will move students to Regular Decision and, consequently, ask for their senior year
transcripts.

If students are not working to their capabilities, it is possible that colleges will question such students.
“If we see that you failed a class then we might actually revoke our decision,” Oftedal said. “And, if you don’t graduate high school, you don’t get (admitted).”

Despite Oftedal’s concerns, he admits that Westmont is more understanding than stern.

“Numbers don’t always tell the truth because something might have happened your first semester or second semester,” Oftedal said. “If we see that you were a straight A student and then you started getting straight C’s, we might wonder what’s going on and call you. Other schools might not be that tolerant, but that’s just how Westmont (handles those) issues.”

Like McGuire and Oftedal, Advance Placement government teacher, Jarrod Westberg notices that not all seniors are dismissing senior year as an easier year.

In fact, Westberg, who has only taught seniors in his teaching career, said that in recent years, more seniors are challenging themselves.

Although throughout the year, Westberg notices decreasing grades, he remains optimistic that the grade will eventually increase and that the seniors are experiencing what every class before them has
experienced, just small glitches of senioritis.

“I don’t look down at seniors, especially the high- achiever students that have been in AP classes their whole life,” Westberg said. “These kids have been working very hard for a very long time.”

According to Westberg, senioritis do not usually last too long because of our school’s general character.
“This school has always had seniors that have been driven,” Westberg said. “It’s hard to get away from that mentality (because) it just (becomes) second nature to high achievers.”

Senior and AP student Hailey Israel admits that this year she is taking what she calls senior friendly classes.

Among these classes are physiology, in which every two weeks she waits until the night before a test to complete a homework pack, and the Regional Occupation Program, which she will be taking in the spring.

Unlike most ROP classes, Israel’s will allow her to work even more at her three jobs at Cookie Connection, Subway and for senior Haley Harris’s father’s website.

Her reasons for taking AP classes, such as language, art history and government, while still struggling with her elective, art 3, is simple.

“As a senior, I still want to look like I’m doing something,” Israel said. “I just want to make sure that I have the proper course work to impress colleges as a senior.”

Granite Bay High School has a reputation for being a relatively safe school where students and teachers do not have to worry about the level of crime that many schools encounter.   

Although there is still the occasional incident at GBHS involving stolen property, it  does not usually happen on a large scale or is carried out in a teacher’s classroom.    

GBHS government and economics teacher Jason Rath and world history teacher Dale Mortensen , however, suffered just that.   

“In August (2010), I came into (my classroom) to straighten up my files and when I opened my video drawer, I noticed all my videos were missing,” Mortensen said in an email interview. “I thought that maybe (Rath) had borrowed them, so I went next door and looked in his video file. To my surprise, I found all his missing too.”   Mortensen then called Rath and together they notified the Placer County Sheriff. 

Once the report had been filed, Rath and Mortensen tried to discover what they could in order to retrieve their DVDs, but they had limited information.   

“There was no forced entry. (The burglar) knew where to go, they knew where to find (the DVDs)…(which makes me think) it was a previous student or a student that is still here,” Rath said. “I feel and (Mortensen) feels, that it had to have been a student, because nothing else was touched.”   

“Mr. Rath and I began to think of how we might catch the thief,” Mortensen said.   Mortensen and Rath started by looking online for used DVDs, but then Rath had the thought of checking Dimple Records in Roseville.   

“I went in there just on a hunch and I looked at their documentaries and I was like ‘wait that’s mine, that’s mine,’ and everything I pulled off was sold to (Dimple) on two days, June 7 and June 11, so they knew I wasn’t in there making things up because I had no way to tell that (the DVDs) were all sold on those days,” Rath said.   

Once he had satisfactorily proved to Dimple Records that the DVDs were in fact his and Mortensen’s, Dimple Records released the name of the man who sold them to the store: Andrew Wireman, who had given his license, and therefore his name, to Dimple Records in order to make the sale.   

But the case did not end immediately when Wireman’s name turned up.   Jeff Moore, who, as the Placer County Deputy District Attorney, prosecuted Wireman once, was able to explain why.   

“(Wireman) was charged with receiving stolen property because we were able to determine that he sold the DVDs to Dimple Records in Roseville,” Moore said. “(But) from (the county’s) perspective we didn’t have enough evidence to be able to tell who took the DVDs from the school… so we didn’t really have any idea who took the DVDs.”   

Because of this fact, Wireman was prosecuted for selling Rath and Mortensen’s property, but not for burglary or entering into a school building.   

According to Rath, Wireman had no direct connection to GBHS, and therefore would not have known specifically where to find the stolen property, making Rath believe that Wireman did not work alone.   

“He wasn’t the one who took them… (someone) just gave (the DVDs) to him to sell and he probably just kept some of the profit,” Rath said.   

But Wireman took the criminal high road and refused to reveal the names of the burglars no matter what.    “He knows, but he won’t talk, he won’t tell you who it was that did it,” Rath said. “I guess there is honor amongst thieves.”   

A year later the case was finally scheduled to go to court.   

“I got a subpoena, I was supposed to go to a trial… then it was pushed back, then I got a call that said he pleaded out,” Rath said. “He took four years of jail for stealing my and (Mortensen’s) DVDs. They even asked him and he wouldn’t talk.”   

Rath was disappointed with the result of the trial.   

“I told the district that I didn’t want to press charges against him… I just wanted (to catch) the guy that gave (the DVDs) to him, because somebody around here, either in college or still on this campus, got away with something,” Rath said.   

Despite his disappointment, Rath is trying to look on the bright side.   

“At least somebody close to it is doing time. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t be doing four years for somebody else, especially a high school student… (if I was) 24 or 25 years old.”   

However, Wireman is doing time for more than just this crime, and his decision not to give up the name or names of others involved was not as much a sacrifice as Rath thought.   

Wireman was not, in fact, offered a reduction in his sentence in return for names.   

“I wasn’t willing to deal with him on his sentence because he was also being prosecuted for a separate theft from a church in Roseville,” Moore said. “We consolidated those cases and, due to his criminal history, I wasn’t going to give him any deals.”   

Although Wireman was not given an offer, he did not step forward to offer his potential information either.   Wireman’s case ended with a global sentence of four years for his involvement in the thefts on campus and in Roseville and for a previous probation.   

According to assistant principal Dave Vujovich, the situation Rath and Mortensen have been involved in is very unusual for GBHS teachers, and the school is always looking for ways to prevent such occurrences.    

“In my seven years in the district… I have never seen a large scale theft out of a classroom,” Vujovich said. “We’ve had a bike stolen, or a skateboard, and we typically get those things back.”   

Vujovich was also surprised that the theft was even feasible without anyone observing it.   “Those classrooms are right there in plain view… (If you live) across the street, their bathroom windows face the school. Those classrooms are visible and we do have alarms.”   

However, Vujovich did see one possible way that the thief or thieves might have gotten around the alarms.   “When the alarms get shut down (they do it by sector), if somebody turns off a sector, someone could come in to take something and we could be working (nearby and not notice),” Vujovich said.   

As Vujovich pointed out, Rath’s and Mortensen’s classrooms, which are adjacent to the parking lot, are a very visible area.   

“It’s a high traffic area… it’s not like if I took (something) and stuck it in my pocket. They had to carry stuff out, so (they were) pretty gutsy,” Vujovich said.   

While the school alarms are still in place, the administration is also looking into the possibility of security video cameras, in part to prevent such a theft from happening again.   

“I have a bid for security cameras, all the schools have been looking into it… we are always looking for it but there is a privacy issue,” Vujovich said.   

Even beyond the issue of privacy, the school has purely financial reasons not to purchase video cameras.   “It’s something that we would like to have, but it’s probably something that we wouldn’t want to spend money on especially in these poor economic times.”

Gazette Photo: RACHAEL VASQUEZ

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention says 50 percent of all sexually active men and women will get HPV at some point in their lives, and many will develop cancer as a result. Members of the Granite Bay community can hardly be an exception.

HPV, often associated with cervical cancer, is the most common sexually transmitted infection in America. The problem is, the 20 million people who the CDC say are infected may not know it because HPV generally doesn’t cause any symptoms—until cancer appears.

The CDC estimates that 17,300 women have HPV-associated cancers and that nearly 7,600 men do.
Two vaccines – Gardasil and Carvarix – have been approved by the FDA to protect against 16 of the 18 cancer-causing strains of HPV. The vaccines also protect against genital warts.

Stacy, a pseudonym for a Granite Bay High School junior, was diagnosed with an early stage of cervical cancer when she was 14. Her cancer was passed down through the female members of her family, not contracted because of HPV.

Stacy went to see a doctor after getting nauseous and having stomach pains. At first, she just thought it was her period. But the doctor diagnosed her with cervical cancer.

“I didn’t know what ‘cervical’ meant, but I knew what cancer was,” Stacy said.

Cervical cancer is the most common cancer caused in women by HPV and the third most common overall. The cancer develops very slowly and typically has no symptoms in its early stages. It can be treated easily if found early, as it was with Stacy.

Stacy said she couldn’t imagine why anyone who could prevent cervical cancer by getting a few shots wouldn’t do it.

“It helps you in the long run,” Stacy said. “It gives you a better chance of having a family (because cervical cancer might require having your ovaries removed), and for something that is preventable, why not prevent it?”

The vaccine is “strongly recommended” by the CDC. The vaccine consists of three shots over a six-month period and is recommended to girls 11 or 12 years of age, because the vaccine needs to be given before sexual activity begins.

Kristen Ehresmann, a director at the Minnesota Department of Health, said no one means to insinuate that children are beginning sexual activity when they are 11 years old.

“We suggest that age for vaccination because it is before the onset of sexual activity,” Ehresmann said. “The HPV is very easily transmitted, and once a person is infected the vaccine will be less effective for them.”

Ehresmann said the HPV vaccine is now endorsed for boys, too, to make the vaccine a “standard of care.”

“(The decision) also draws attention to the importance of the vaccine,” Ehresmann said. “This vaccine is an important tool in protecting people against cancer.”

William Schaffner, chair of the Department of Preventative Medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, stressed that HPV doesn’t only affect females, contrary to what was originally believed.

“HPV is a viral infection transmitted sexually that can be a precursor to later development of cancer,” Schaffner said. “The most common type of cancer is in the cervix, but we’ve come to know that it causes other genital and anal cancers… and cancers of the throat, mouth and neck.”

Originally, it was believed that HPV could be eliminated just by vaccinating females, but not enough were getting the shots.

While the federal government has not mandated vaccines, Schaffner wishes it would. He said that, at best, 60 to 70 percent of people would get vaccinated without a mandate.

“Are we going to permit males and females to be unprotected against certain cancers when we know we have a safe and effective vaccine?” Schaffner said. “It would be shameful to allow 30 percent to go unprotected when we have a mechanism of protecting everyone.”

Senior Natalie Kreeger started her vaccination process last year, but she doesn’t believe that the vaccine should be mandated.

“I think education is the key,” Kreeger said. “Forcing people will lead to complaints… but I still think everyone should get the vaccine. I just think we need to focus on awareness.”

Kreeger said her doctor recommended the Gardasil vaccination to her, and she and her family agreed, despite the almost $400 price tag attached.

She said that, because of the side effects and the fact that the vaccination takes place over six months, it was hard to convince herself to keep going back.

“The first time. . . it was just like a normal shot,” Kreeger said. “The second (part of the vaccination) hurt really badly. After the shot, I felt really nauseous for the rest of the day.”

Other side effects can include pain and swelling around the injection site, slight fever, headache, nausea, fainting and muscle aches. In rare cases, people have experienced blood clots or Guillain Barré syndrome, a rare disease that may result in muscle weakness.

Sophomore Derek Smith is also in the middle of the vaccination process.

“My parents and I agreed I should get it so I won’t contract (HPV) later in life,” Smith said. “Doctors have now found that it does lead to cancer in men, so we wanted to prevent that.

“There’s a lot of nasty stuff (HPV) can give you,” Smith said. “It can lead to many other diseases. More people should start getting (the vaccination) because it’s preventing a disease you could potentially kill off, and that makes sense.”

Decavel-Bueff suffers from the spinal condition scoliosis. Her vertebrae are shaped into an “s” and the curvature in her lumbar is more dramatic than in a healthy spine. Like many other students with scoliosis at Granite Bay High School, she was first diagnosed in middle school.

The family didn’t act upon her condition until a day in the pool when Decavel-Bueff was in her swimsuit and her mother noticed her hip protruding out.

She would have to wear a brace for six months, which she would only escape from during PE when her doctor allowed her to take it off.

“I was really embarrassed at first because I had to wear baggy clothes because I didn’t want anyone to see it,” Decavel-Bueff said.

The brace’s function wasn’t to correct the curvature, but to keep it from worsening through her growth spurt.
She now takes palates once a week to strengthen the muscles in her back for support to treat her scoliosis.
Lynda Farley, the nurse at Olympus Junior High School who first identified Decavel-Bueff’s condition, aims to catch as many cases of scoliosis as she possibly can.

She and a coworker perform a screening on the 7th grade girls and 8th grade boys once a year. She does it this way because most girls reach puberty earlier than most boys. A small curvature can become much more ill shapen during a growth spurt.

Farley has the middle schoolers remove their shirts and carefully inspects the alignment of their shoulders, scapulas and hips to make sure they are even. She then has them bend over to check for a lump on either side of their backs.

Kids who don’t pass the exam receive a phone call from Farley recommending them for a follow-up appointment with a doctor.

Farley finds signs of scoliosis in a very small percentage of students and gives only five or six referrals between both middle schools annually. However, she thinks the screenings are well worth the effort for the cases they do diagnose.

Junior Olivia Nasir also suffers from the spinal affliction. Her scoliosis was caught by a doctor in elementary school and in sixth grade she wore a brace all day and all night. Nasir, like Decavel-Bueff, was embarrassed of her brace and after the first year of wearing it, switched to only wearing it at night.

“My ribs were grinding against my hipbone, so it was really painful,” Nasir said.

As she got older, Nasir began to notice the pain more and more as the curve got worse.

For three years she slept in a back brace, up until freshmen year when her doctor informed her that the treatment wasn’t working and surgery would be the only option.

Nasir had the surgery this past summer. Doctors made an incision from the side of her back to her shoulder blade, removed a rib and inserted it in her back and put metal rods in between her vertebrae. After a bed ridden week in the hospital drugged up on pain medication, Nasir would have to wear yet another back brace.
For the first two months following her surgery, she would wear the brace 24/7. Afterwards, the brace would be worn only when she went out, for caution. This meant she would have to wear a brace at school again.
“I think most people ignore it because they don’t want to be rude,” Nasir said.

However, she didn’t let the brace bother her.

“It (was) only temporary,” Nasir said.

Wearing a brace wasn’t a big deal for her. The only down side was not being able to wear anything sleeveless because it would cause irritation.

Although Nasir is now free of scoliosis, her children may not be. There is proof that scoliosis is hereditary. Nasir’s mom had the condition, and Decavel-Bueff’s brother suffers from it as well.

Sept. 30 was the last day Nasir had to wear any kind of brace forever and she will never have to worry about her scoliosis again.

“It’s nice not to have to worry about scoliosis anymore,” Nasir said.

GBHS’ fan-based cheering section was started last year, and has grown continuously larger ever since.

The idea for a student-oriented cheering section began a few years ago.

“A couple of years back a group of students tried (to) show up to soccer and basketball games and would get together and cheer the players on, but it wasn’t that successful,” said Tim Healy, social science teacher and faculty advisor to The Tribe.

Healy’s involvement in The Tribe includes helping out Tribe members, giving them recommendations on what is appropriate and what is not, aiding The Tribe with its barbeques and buying official Tribe shirts.

“(Will Harkin, Hunter Christian and I) sit down usually and have meetings once in a while about how they can make sure we’re channeling their energy in positive ways,” Healy said.

“I would say that our school has never really had a large amount of student support, which is kind of ironic because we are (one of the) most prolific high schools in northern California when it comes to athletics,” Healy said.

Healy is incredibly proud of the success of The Tribe. He believes it adds a new energy to the school that was lacking before.

“I think that the level of energy (The Tribe) brings to sporting events makes the entire sporting event more enjoyable,” Healy said. “I’ve had parents come up to me and say how fun or crazy that game was, especially the energy from the Tribe.”

The Tribe’s success reached its pinnacle point last year, when the boys’ varsity basketball team faced off against  McClymonds High School in the play off game at Arco Arena.

The Tribe showed up in large numbers for the team’s appearance at Arco Arena, totalling around 500 Tribe supporters.

“I like what The Tribe is doing for this school… it’s bringing all classes together,” Healy said. “Our school is notorious for being divided into cliques and The Tribe is trying to get past that.”

Last month, the soccer game against Jesuit High School-played at Capital Christian High School-drew a large crowd of Tribe members.

The Tribe even has its own Facebook fan page with over 600 followers.

“I thought it was a pretty cool idea (when I first heard about it). I thought getting a group of people together cheering would be good,” said senior Jake Neptune, who manages the Facebook fan page.

Senior Jordan Long, Harkin, Christian and Neptune, all are predominant members of The Tribe and put in the most work. They are the ones leading the chants at sporting events and other activities attended by The Tribe.

Once a game starts, Tribe leaders begin to lead the chants and make sure that everyone is participating. They also make sure that the chants are appropriate and best support the athletes.

Christian and Harkin are noticing that the turnout for this year is an improvement from last year, but the noise level this year is not as loud as they would like.

“The only problem with the cheering of the Tribe is that some of the underclassmen aren’t getting as involved as they should,” Long said. “They should be louder and shouldn’t take up seats if they are not going to participate.”

With this year’s Tribe having such a great support from a majority of upperclassmen, many seniors wonder who the leaders will be next year.

“Will (Harkin) and Hunter (Christian) had the most input and spirit last year as juniors so all of that just transferred over to this year,” Long said.

It’s too early to tell who will step up next year.

“It’s not about who’s leading what,” Christian said. “It’s about getting as many people out to the games.”

Despite their success, the Tribe has experienced problems over the past two years.

During the football team’s opening home game against St. Mary’s High School this year, a group of students that were sitting on the edge of The Tribe’s section were standing up and cheering when a parent became frustrated that The Tribe section had been moved and the fans were blocking the parent’s view of her child playing in the game.

“She started swearing and yelling at us. I couldn’t believe that a parent would use such language towards us. I was shocked,” an anonymous Tribe member said.

Originally , the section that had been reserved for The Tribe was originally right next to the band. It was later moved closer to the entrance of the bleachers, a move that would upset some parents who had already been sitting there.

“(The parent) said that (The Tribe) was blocking her view and that we needed to move somewhere else,” the Tribe member said. “I went and talked to Student Government and the students said that what we were doing was fine.”

The student who was yelled at believes that in order to prevent further instances like this from happening, the Tribe’s section boundaries should be increased to decrease the occurrence of upset parents and to allow more Tribe members to join the section.

At last year’s first home football game, Tribe members dressed up as Native Indians, which included headpieces, body paint and Indian feathers.

The community didn’t find the costumes as positive as the Tribe leaders had intended. The result was the prohibition of Native American attire from future events.

During the first 2011 football home game, the Tribe offered any supporter free body paint.

“Someone in Student Government bought a type of body paint that didn’t come off easily after most people got home,” Neptune said. “It stayed on for a couple of days after the Friday game.”

Although it has suffered through some rough patches, the spirit of the Tribe can not be set back by any problems it has had.

“One of the things I love most about the Tribe is that it is so open and accepting,” Long said. “It’s a (group) where anyone with school spirit can come to cheer on their fellow classmen.”