Miramonte's Matadors won a section championship in November 2025. Keeping it will require surviving one of the toughest schedules in the North Coast Section.
Third-year head coach Nick Safir returns a roster loaded with playoff experience, headlined by junior quarterback Lane Dalton and running back Jonah Imberg. But a five-game gauntlet starting in Week 4, featuring district rivals Campolindo and Acalanes, could determine whether the defending NCS Division 4 champions earn a shot at repeating.
"He's taken charge of the offense," Safir told The Orinda News. "Everybody has relaxed and bought into him."
Safir was talking about Dalton, who got his first varsity start in Miramonte's regular-season finale loss to Campolindo in late October 2025 and then played the final five games of the season with a broken finger. In the NCS Division 4 title game on Nov. 29, 2025, Dalton completed 16-of-22 passes for 246 yards and rushed for two touchdowns as Miramonte rallied from 14-0 down to beat Hayward 28-21 at Moreau Catholic High. Imberg added 111 rushing yards and two scores.
That championship, the program's 11th section title, capped a season-long transformation. Miramonte's run ended a week later with a 35-7 loss to Calaveras in the CIF NorCal Division 5-A Regional Final on Dec. 6, 2025.
Deeper than ever
When Safir arrived, his varsity roster had 25 players and there was no freshman team. He added a freshman squad in 2025, and the 2026 varsity could carry as many as 40 players. That depth means fewer two-way starters and fresher legs in the trenches.
Four offensive linemen return as starters: Jack White, Brooks Butler, Dave Greenstone and Jackson Thompson. None are expected to play defense in 2026. The receiving corps features George Gilbert, Parker Bjornson, Michael Fagundes, Colton Bernstein and Tre Murphy. Harrison Feusier will share backfield snaps with Imberg, a multi-sport standout who hit .377 with a 1.57 ERA for Miramonte baseball in spring 2026.
On defense, Ben Romweber and Cooper Buster anchor the line, Tres Buster leads the linebackers, and Henry Hunt, Gilbert and Feusier patrol the secondary.
The biggest hole is kicker.
James Rogers, who handled punting and placekicking at an elite level, graduated. Julian Salter, a transfer from De La Salle, is among the candidates but must sit out five games before becoming eligible.
The schedule problem
The Diablo Athletic League realigned before this season, placing Miramonte in the DAL Valley division rather than the top tier Safir had requested. That alone wouldn't be punishing, but Acalanes Union High School District policy requires its four schools to play each other. So Miramonte must schedule Campolindo and Acalanes as non-league games on top of league opponents Northgate and Las Lomas.
The result: a five-game stretch starting in Week 4 that runs Windsor, Campolindo, Acalanes, Las Lomas and Northgate. In the 2025 NCS playoffs, Campolindo was the No. 1 seed in Division 2 with an 8-2 record.
Compounding the challenge, NCS shifted its postseason format before the 2025 season from MaxPreps computer ratings to a straight win-count system. Safir said a team likely needs at least six wins to qualify for the playoffs, a tough bar when half the schedule features section contenders.
New Miramonte principal Bill Schloss, who started July 1, said football is "kind of the tone-setter at the beginning of the school year." The Matadors will find out quickly whether their deeper roster can handle the load.
What's ahead
Miramonte opens the 2026 season at home against Oakland Tech on Friday, Aug. 28. Granada and Montgomery round out the non-league slate. The five-game gauntlet begins in Week 4, with specific dates for those contests not yet published.
