SANTA ANA- It was Mystery Monday at Mater Dei, where football coach Bruce Rollinson was searching for clues.

"I try to get a read," Rollinson said, "on where we're at physical-conditioning wise. I want to know, 'What have they done these last three weeks during the dead period?'"

Monday was the first day of practice for many Orange County high school football teams. Some started last week, one started two weeks ago (Edison, which on Monday left for Hawaii - Maui, specifically - to play a game there Saturday) and others will get going Monday.

This is what used to be called "Hell Week" long ago but is a heck of a lot better these days, with coaches' deeper understanding of proper hydration and the year-around conditioning programs that are essential to every football operation in the county.

Teams that started practicing Monday are coming off of the CIF-mandated three-week "dead period" during which no school coach-organized practice can take place. It might seem difficult to believe that teen-aged athletes can get out of shape in only three weeks, but it happens.

The first three days are limited to conditioning. The only football equipment that can be used is football footwear, helmets, footballs, blocking bags and arm shields. After three days of that, full contact in full pads can commence.

At Mater Dei, already included in a couple of national rankings with more likely to follow, players arrived at 7 a.m. on Monday.

"Basically," Rollinson said, "this is when we try to get all of the legal things organized and done - physicals, insurance forms, fees and equipment, and as expeditiously as possible."

The goal was to have players on the field and ready to go at 9:30 a.m., and that goal was met … mostly.

After assembling players and coaches at midfield for a quick pep talk and a prayer, Rollinson had an important question that he knew, from 19 previous seasons as Monarchs head coach, might not produce the preferred answer: "Does everyone have their mouthguards?"

Uh …

"Well, then, hurry up!"

And 10 players sprinted back to the locker rooms to retrieve theirs.

At least one player about whom Rollinson is not worried about being prepared is Matt Barkley. Barkley is going into his senior year as Mater Dei's quarterback, after being named Gatorade's national football player of the year and then Gatorade's national male athlete of the year following his junior year, an unprecedented accomplishment.

A quarterback is expected to be a leader, a senior is expected to be a leader, so a senior quarterback really has to be a team commander.

Barkley, 6-foot-3 and 222, looking fit, rested and ready to go, was among the first players to take the field Monday. He wore a green mesh practice jersey, with No. 5, the number he has worn since he started at varsity quarterback as a freshman in 2005. Green is Mater Dei's "don't pummel this guy" color for quarterbacks to differentiate them from the red that other position players wore; other teams with other color schemes put their quarterbacks in red practice jerseys.

"Jog it on," Barkley said, with calm authority, to teammates who were walking to the practice field.

And, during wind sprints, Barkley was usually the first of his group to cross the finish line, to which Rollinson called out, "Way to lead 'em, 5!"

Mater Dei has a challenging schedule, starting with its first game on Sept. 3 against Carson at Veterans Stadium in Long Beach, a game to be televised nationally by ESPN2. The Monarchs have other nonleague games against Centennial of Corona and Edison, then the Trinity League with excellent teams like Orange Lutheran and Servite and improved Santa Margarita. If all goes well for Mater Dei, what follows would be the playoffs, starting in November, in the toughest division in the West, the Pac-5 Division.

Rollinson hopes he can say "Way to lead 'em, 5!" in mid-December, too.

Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com