CORONA, Calif. – It’s a long way to the top... and it’s even harder to stay there.

For 23 years Corona’s Centennial High School Head Coach Matt Logan has built one of the most prominent and consistent high school footballs programs in southern California and the U.S.

“We feel like we work harder than everybody else that’s out there. I’m sure everybody says that, but we truly believe that and we do,” says Logan.

It’s hard to call his Huskies underdogs, but that mentality keeps them hungry for more.

RELATED | Mater Dei LB Relishes Biggest Game of the Year

The Huskies won their 53rd straight Big VIII game en route to the 2019 league title, and his 10 CIF Southern Section championships are a résumé of their own.

But at the root of his success is a blue collar mentality that, in an era of high school recruitment, has managed to build four and five star recruits through cultivating home-grown talent.

“And that’s a big thing for us, just keep our kids here. Keep our Corona kids in Corona. That’s a big deal. It’s not so much to attract other people, it’s just to keep ours here. We got plenty of talent here, plenty of players here. And so yeah there is pride in that, that most of our kids local and they come here because they want to play football and want do well in school,” says Logan.

And it’s fitting that Centennial is one of the few public schools to compete with the talent-filled rosters of some the best high school teams in the country.

In Division 1, all roads will likely go through either Mater Dei or St. John Bosco - the teams that have eliminated Centennial for three straight years.

“That’s what we talk about in our offseason, stuff like that is playing at that level. Not so much those particular teams. But those are the two that seem to end up there. But yeah it’s playing at that level and being that type of football team. Being that caliber of football team,” Logan says.rs.