By admin 
What might initially catch your attention walking into the place could be the scores of athletes racing onto the field to stretch, and at Grant High School, those Pacers are generally an impressive lot.
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Twenty Pacers players have scholarship offers to play NCAA Division I football, including sophomores and juniors.
The nationally recognized drum line under director James Van Buren is impossible to miss, the sounds of talent and joy.
But what’s different this fall on the 94-year-old campus is the sparkling new football field turf, a state-of-the art track and press/coaches box, upgrades that add gloss to a place that stands as a crown jewel in Del Paso Heights.
Ranked third in the region by The Sacramento Bee, Grant beat Cathedral Catholic of Los Angeles, 21-7, in a nonleague contest on Friday night to officially break in the new digs on Mike Alberghini Field.
Fresno State-bound running back Jayson Williams scored on two short first-half runs, and Sacramento State-committed receiver and playmaker Koby Shabazz found the endzone on an end-around run for a 21-0 lead with 3:52 left to play.
The Pacers (1-1) especially impressed on defense with a throwback effort after getting taken to task in an opening loss to state-ranked Central East of Fresno. Until the 1:43 point of the final quarter, Grant shut out a prolific team that came in at 2-0 after scoring 52 and 43 points in successive weeks.
The Grant offense remains a work in progress, with a penalty negating a 76-yard touchdown pass from Blake Nycum to Cal-committed receiver Zo Edwards and field goal issues. But this is another Grant team of promise and potential.
“We can be really good, but we have to get better,” Grant coach Carl Reed said.
Grant box showcases staying power
Rutherford Memorial Stadium’s field is named after the Sacramento’s winningest prep football coach with 282 victories, a man who went by “Coach Al” and was the driving force of intensity and encouragement in steering the Pacers to glory. Mike Alberghini was The Bee’s Coach of the Decade for the 1990s and again for the 2000s. His name is on the new field, on both sidelines, next to the program’s decades-long motto of “Pacer4Life.”
Alberghini died in early 2025 at 78, but his legacy remains in spirit and his results displayed prominently on the press box. Each of Grant’s 10 CIF Sac-Joaquin Section championships are listed on the front of the venue, the first coming in 1992 with six more won by Coach Al.
The last three such banners came under the direction of co-head coaches Carl Reed and Syd Thompson, in 2022, 2023 and 2025. That was a run that saw Grant win three CIF Northern California championships and two CIF State crowns.
Grant’s famed 2008 team remains the only public school to reach and win the elite Open Division state final, beating Long Beach Poly. Two Grant stars from that team — quarterback Kipeli Koniseti and running back Devonte Booker — are now on the Pacers coaching staff. Reed and Thompson are also former Pacer players and assistant coaches.
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The stadium upgrades are from a school-bonded measure that passed three years ago. This allowed significant athletic upgrades in the Twin Rivers Unified School District, including Grant’s new baseball and softball diamonds.
Football and other athletic upgrades have also spruced up the other high schools in the district including Highlands (opened in 1958), Rio Linda (opened in 1962) and Foothill (opened in 1965).
At Grant, the old press box had all the charm and smells of a moldy muffler shop. The windows fogged up when coaches yelled into their headsets or when it rained. There were grates on the outside of the windows. The floors were rickety and a bit unstable.
“We used to think about what day we’re going to fall through the floor,” said Reed with a laugh.
Now the press box is pristine. It even smells new. And what’s this? Air conditioning in each of the press box rooms?
“We have good things happening at 400 Grand Avenue,” Grant athletic director Anthony Malisauskas during a quick tour to visit the press box. “This is all voted on by the communities, the bonds. We are an important part to this community. I grew up in Napa, and Memorial Stadium was our hub on Friday nights. This is Grant’s hub on Friday nights forever.”
Said Reed, “It all looks fantastic. It’s great to see a community and district invest in the school and the kids. It keeps the kids coming here. It keeps the school relevant. It keeps up motivated, and it keeps the athletes here feeling important and special.”
Grant alumni spirit runs deep
What sustains Grant is the amount how many players have followed their brothers, their cousins, their fathers, uncles and grandparents to Grant. Coaches on the sideline wear caps that have the year that they graduated on the back.
Reed is a 1997 Pacers graduate. His father, Lynn Reed, graduated from Grant in 1978 and has coached track and football at Grant for decades.
“It says a lot about what we’ve done here over the years,” Carl Reed said. “A lot of schools around here and anywhere had their heyday and were great, and now they’ve gone to nothing. Sad to see. But here, we hit rock bottom a few years ago. We were a winless team, a one-win team.
“Now we’re back in contention all the time, and I think that’s the most beautiful thing about this place in this community.”
Read more Friday’s Sacramento-area HS football scores and next week’s schedule