Demaje Riley (left) had more than 1,000 yards receiving as a freshman at Tulare. At right, Mater Dei freshman Mark Bowman scores on a TD pass during CIF Open Division state final. Photos: Hudl.com & Scott Kurtz / Cal-Hi Sports.
One week after the Super Bowl and two weeks after the last of our annual all-state teams went out, we look to the future. Here is a watch list of leading freshmen football players in the state from the 2023 season who are on track to be all-state sophomores next season. Zach Benitez from Granite Hills of El Cajon was named State Freshman Player of the Year before the first of our several all-state teams were announced. This isn’t an all-state team since the same format as the others can’t be duplicated, but it’s as close as we can get. These also are not recruiting lists. This post was amended from an initial list of freshmen to watch that was posted before the end of the regular season.
This is a post for our Gold Club members only on CalHiSports.com. To join our Gold Club to get this feature, all new state rankings in five sports, state record updates and all of the all-state team announcements, CLICK HERE.
For this year’s First Team All-State Offense plus three multi-purpose players, CLICK HERE.
For this year’s First Team Defense plus three more multi-purpose players,
CLICK HERE.
For this year’s Second & Third Team (Gold Club post), CLICK HERE.
MORE OF OUR 45TH ANNUAL ALL-STATE FOOTBALL TEAMS:
Medium Schools | Small Schools | Juniors (Gold Club) | Sophomores (Gold Club) | Players of Year by region (NorCal/SoCal) | Players of Year by positions QB, RB, WR/TE, Line, LB, DB | FINAL All-State Nominations for CIFSS plus LA, SD & Central plus NorCal
Notes: As mentioned in the other posts about all-state sophomores and all-state juniors, this is not a Class of 2027 recruiting list. We did not watch film of the Mater Dei-St. John Bosco freshman game to look for top players, either. These are all players listed below who “did something” in varsity games during the season. Other players will emerge down the road as they get varsity playing time.
