Lindhurst colors won't wave Friday night

They're red and white, the size of four-wheel drive vehicles, portray the pride of Lindhurst High — and won't be flying when the school's football team plays rival Marysville High in an epic football showdown Friday night.

The school flags of Lindhurst High have to be pinned and presented as banners at the home field of Marysville High School when the teams play in the Sac-Joaquin Section Div. VI championship game.

"We can bring our flags. They cannot go on the football field," Lindhurst High School Principal Bob Eckardt said of the banner requirement at a community meeting this week. "That sounds trivial — or at least it does to me."

To Melissa Mosley Linson, a 1990 graduate of the Olivehurst high school, it sounds like more of the same from Marysville.

"We just have always been looked down upon by Marysville," Linson said of the historic city and its view of the Yuba County communities of Olivehurst and Linda that give Lindhurst High its name. "Marysville just thinks it's the best around. Period."

Until the start of this decade when Lindhurst High added lights to its football field, the school played its home games at War Memorial Stadium in Marysville.

"We hated it," she said.

Linson said a Stanislaus County high school that traveled to Lindhurst for a playoff game last month was able to bring its school flag.

Marysville High Principal Gary Cena said no slight is intended to Lindhurst because of the flag rule. The Golden Empire League that Lindhurst and Marysville play in has an understanding that only the football players of home teams can take the field with their school flags, Cena said. That allows only Marysville High's black flag with orange and white lettering to fly Friday.

Waterford High School in Stanislaus County is in a different league.

Its principal, Don Davis, said he understands the appeal of school flags — as well as the problems they can pose. "It only takes a few people to get offended and it can escalate," Davis said, recalling a game in the South Athletic League that includes Waterford when another school planted its flag at the 50-yard line in a football game. "It was definitely in your face."

Pete Saco, commissioner of the California Interscholastic Federation's, Sac-Joaquin Section, said Golden Empire League polices govern the flag matter.

Saco said school flags have proven a problem in some games in the Sac-Joaquin section.

"I've had four to five fights break out," he said of the flags — and added that people are asked to leave them in the parking lot."

Mike Haines, Golden Empire League commissioner, said of the rule, "It's an issue we'll need to discuss."

Cena said the league plans a review at its Jan. 20 meeting.

The Marysville High principal said when the school played at home last month against Lindhurst to determine the Golden Empire League championship, he saw some Lindhurst supporters walk in the stadium with flags. Cena said he reminded them they can't fly the flags and that the Lindhurst fans cooperated.

The Nov. 14 game that Marysville won 21-14 is followed by Friday's showdown between the two Yuba County high schools for the Section championship.

"That was big," Cena said of the first game.

"This is gigantic," he said of Friday's contest.

Marysville High Student Body President Alexis Grove, 17, who's also a cheerleader and will be at the title game, said such events are already loaded with tension.

"I don't think a flag will make a difference," Grove said.

What: Sac-Joaquin Section Division VI football championship

Who: Lindhurst High vs. Marysville High

Where: War Memorial Stadium, Marysville

When: 7:30 p.m.

Contact Appeal reporter Ryan McCarthy at 749-4707 or rmccarthy@appeal-democrat.com