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A sure way to keep a football player from getting a concussion is to not let him play football.

A sure way to increase a football player’s chances of getting a concussion is to have him play more football.

The California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) has made a laudable effort in educating coaches and athletic administrators about reducing concussions and what to do when concussions occur.

Going in the opposite direction, the CIF has its CIF Regional Championship bowl games today and Saturday. The CIF State Championship bowl games are next week.

Most teams that advance to next week’s state finals will be playing their 16th game of the season.

UCLA and USC will play 13 games this season. The NFL plays 16 regular-season games. NFL teams played 14 regular-season games from 1961-77, and 12 regular-season games from 1947-61.

St. Margaret’s, Orange County football’s lone representative in the CIF state football playoffs, already has played 14 games.

Fourteen games might be too many for teen-aged boys. No question, then, that 15 or 16 games are too many.

Taking a look around Orange County high school sports:

• Time Warner Cable will show taped coverage of Friday night’s St. Margaret’s game on TWC Community on Monday at 8 p.m. All of the regional and state championship games will be streamed live at http://www.livestream.com/twcsports.

• St. Margaret’s has been a small-schools football standout for decades. Among the Tartans’ top players this year is Preston Ellis, who leads the county in interceptions with nine.

• In listing the Garden Grove players on the offensive line and tight end positions who were crucial to the team’s march to the Southern Division championship, we missed tight end Michael Trujillo.

• Mater Dei senior linebacker/receiver Ben Humphreys is a nominee for the Glenn Davis Award, part of the U.S. Army All-American Game. The award is for, as explained in a press release, exemplifying “the Army’s high standard of excellence in community service, education and athletic distinction.”

• Scholarship offers for county football players will increase in coming weeks as we close in on the letter-of-intent signing period that begins Feb.4. San Clemente senior linebacker Riley Whimpey, whose last name is nothing like the way he plays, added an offer from Boise State this week.

• Tesoro junior quarterback Devon Modster has offers from Arizona and Arizona State. Modster is that throws-well, runs-well quarterback that is highly sought these days.

• Girls water polo is a winter sport and boys water polo is a fall sport. Can’t they both be fall sports? Boys and girls basketball and boys and girls soccer are played during the same season.

• Boys and girls polo can’t both be fall sports because not enough schools have pools. It would be noble if at the state level boys water polo teams agreed to alternate fall/winter seasons with the girls: boys water polo would be a fall sport one school year and would be a winter sport the next year, with girls polo being a winter sport one year and a fall sport the next.

• Westminster boys basketball senior Tyler Burch, who sought to transfer to Cantwell Sacred Heart of Montebello but decided to remain at Westminster, was averaging 24 points a game for the Lions going into Friday.

• Sonora boys basketball senior guard Ben Rico, who was on our preseason top 10 players to watch list, has been out the past few games because of a deep bone bruise on an ankle. He suffered the injury in the Raiders’ season opener against La Costa Canyon. Sonora coaches figure Rico won’t play for the next two weeks.

• Mater Dei boys basketball coach Gary McKnight would get his 1,000th career win today if the Monarchs beat host school Corona del Mar in the Beach Bash tournament. McKnight would be the first California high school boys basketball coach to get 1,000 wins.

• The state leader in girls basketball coach victories is Joe Vaughn, who coached Buena of Ventura to 761 wins from 1976 to 2007. Mater Dei coach Kevin Kiernan came into this season at No.6 in state girls basketball history, with 641. Kiernan collected plenty of wins at La Quinta and at Troy.

• A presentation recognizing McKnight’s 1,000th win will be made at Mater Dei on Jan.9 before the Monarchs’ first home game of the season, a Trinity League game against JSerra.

• With two Beach Bash games to play, and the City of Palms and Max Preps tournaments to come later this month, and a league game at St. John Bosco on Jan.7, it’s probably a safe bet that McKnight will get that 1,000th win before Jan.9.

Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com