First in a two-part series. Part II coming Wednesday.
SAN JOSE — What has changed for Bellarmine football since last fall?
It is the question that has been on the minds of interested observers since the Bells completed the first 0-10 season in school history last November.
Bellarmine is clearly a long way away from returning to the heights that the storied program once called home. For decades, the Bells were perched at the top of the West Catholic Athletic League and Bay Area high school football at large, winning section and regional championships and sending players to college and in some cases the NFL.
One of those players, former Super Bowl champion David Diaz-Infante, is entering his third season as head coach. He is trying to pull Bellarmine out of the doldrums and into the modern era of high school football.
How close is he to bringing the Bells back?
“There’s not a lot of us,” Diaz-Infante observed at the conclusion of a recent 6 a.m. practice. “We’re not real big. But the guys are working hard. We’re getting there.”
As Bellarmine looks ahead to the next few years, getting players will be a big part of the future success. Since the end of last season, the program’s former head coach, Jalal Beauchman, has returned to lead the offense and generate interest in the school – and football – as part of his new position on the faculty.
Former Bellarmine head coach Jalal Beauchman, shown here working with players during practice this month, has returned to the program to lead the offense. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)
To some extent, the current problem with the program is a numbers game.
Bellarmine finished last season with about 30 healthy players after starting with 48. At the morning practice this month that the Bay Area News Group attended, the Bells had 38 varsity players participating.
Diaz-Infante noted that some players were gone and would be back the following week. Bellarmine athletic director Kevin Saldivar said the Bells have 47 players on the varsity roster, including 16 returners from last year’s team and three transfers.
The numbers are starting to improve at the lower levels. Diaz-Infante said Bellarmine’s freshman team has about 70 players and several look like future contributors.
“We probably have the best freshman class we’ve had in 10 years,” Diaz-Infante said.
But a brighter future isn’t going to happen overnight.
“We’re still a year away from being competitive,” Diaz-Infante said. “But we got a lot of young guys that played last year. They’re moving up, so the future’s looking better.”
State of affairs
Bellarmine football players go through passing drills during a practice this month. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)
The Bellarmine ecosystem that Diaz-Infante entered in 2023 was far different from the one he remembered as a student at the school in the early 1980s.
“We kind of got away a little bit from the role athletics really plays in the overall picture of the school and development of the total person,” he said. “Our academics are always strong. But when I was here, we were state champs of football and state champs of speech and debate. So one does not take away from the other.”
One thing Bellarmine can fall back on this season is the return of Beauchman.
Beauchman, a former wide receiver for the Bells under legendary head coach Mike Janda, took the reins of the Bellarmine program in 2020 and coached the team through 2022, a run that included an appearance in the Central Coast Section Division I semifinals and a CCS Division II championship.
Beauchman is now Bellarmine’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach.
Diaz-Infante praised the former head coach’s ability to lead and teach offense, which he believes will be an asset for the Bells.
For his part, Beauchman said the decision to come back to Bellarmine was multi-faceted. When he resigned as head coach, he was looking to spend more time on his personal life.
Life changes
While away, he got married and had his first child. Now a dad, he was ready to return to coaching while also accepting a job on campus as Bellarmine’s Christian Service and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Associate.
“I have a lot of fond memories of this place when I was a student here, as a football player, as a coach,” Beauchman said. “It hurt to be away, and it hurt to see what’s transpired since I’ve left, in terms of how the games have been going, and not only the result, but just the manner of which we’ve been losing.
“So having coach Diaz reach out to me and asking me if I’d be interested in coming back, it was a no-brainer for me. Because I figured I want to be part of the solution versus just watching it from the sideline.”
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The new union will likely determine whether Bellarmine will sink or swim in the coming years. Diaz-Infante emphasized the importance of having coaches like Beauchman on campus full time, noting that many other WCAL schools have five or more football coaches on staff in roles beyond coaching.
Diaz-Infante singled out Serra coach Patrick Walsh and St. Francis coach Greg Calcagno as WCAL peers who have been sounding boards for him as he looks to rebuild the Bells back to what they were not too long ago.
“Those two guys, they’ve been at it a long time, and they’ve been successful,” Diaz-Infante said. “So the formula is there. We can’t expect to do things differently and yield the same result. The footprint’s there. We’ve just got to get back to that, and I believe we’re headed in the right direction.”