The Santa Monica High School football team is looking to bounce back after a disappointing 2024 campaign that ended with the Vikings missing the playoffs.
Coming off a season-opening 35-0 win against Kaimuki High School in Hawaii, the Samohi Vikings hope to continue the momentum after a combination of injuries and getting physically outmatched resulted in a disappointing 4-6 record in 2024. Coach Carter Paysinger said the team has shown him they’re willing to work hard enough to improve on where they fell short last season.
“Our offseason starts really in January and you can get a good idea of what kind of team you have by their work habits and the things that they're doing in the off season,” Paysinger said. “We’re a lot stronger than we were last year. Again, the work that the kids put into the off season is really showing. The other thing is, unfortunately, in all sports, you have seasons where injuries play a part, and that was our case last year. So, being stronger physically, we’re hoping that that will help us in that area.”
The team faces the challenge of losing star quarterback Wyatt Brown, who helped lead the Vikings to the California Interscholastic Federation finals in 2023 as a sophomore and transferred to Sherman Oaks Notre Dame last spring. However, Payinger said the team is more than capable of adjusting and expects his current seniors to lead the team in Brown’s absence.
“We’ve got a senior dominated team,” he said. “We’ve got a good group of seniors and a really good group of young guys that are playing for us this year, and it goes back to January. We came together as a team in January, and the guys developed that chemistry, teamwork, discipline and playing for each other back in January.”
In particular, Payinger said he expects senior receiver Payton Seals and senior inside linebacker/running back Isaiah Fernandez, both of whom also played an important role in the 2023 finals run, to make up the difference.
“He had a really good year last year, was all league first team, and he is obviously not satisfied,” Payinger said of Seals, who received 415 yards in the 2024 campaign. “You can just see his leadership and his work, having done some things that he’s done over the last several months, that he’s ready to play this year.”
But no matter the amount of preparation, Payinger knows from his long coaching career that luck is another significant factor in a team staying healthy and succeeding. Beyond success on the field, he said that football is a platform to teach the young men on his team skills for life.
“We focus on teaching life skills, time management, responsibility, respect, teamwork,” he said. “We believe that if we are able to master the life skills that we talk about daily, then everything else will take care of itself – from the wins and losses on the field to our kids growing as young adults.”
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By SAM MULICK