The San Leandro Pirates (2-0) face off against the Granada Matadors (1-1) in Livermore, which is one of the toughest teams on their schedule. The last time these two teams faced off was back in the 2023 season where the Matadors blew out the Pirates 56-20 at Burrell Field.

Here’s how the San Leandro Pirates will prepare for this tough away game on Friday night looking to stay undefeated heading to 3-0.

“It’s going to be more intense practices, we got to get ready for the physicality that they’re going to bring. It’s going to be a tough game, so we have to prepare mentally and physically,” said Head Coach Brad Bowers. “We want to be the aggressor, we want to take it to them and not wait for them to light our fire, we’re not just kind of catching, we want to attack.”

The pirates are entering the game without a few key players on the roster due to injuries, a win against Granada would mean a lot to the team.

“It will give us a big energy boost, big confidence builder to go 3-0, going into the rest of the season makes a big difference for just our confidence for the rest of the season, and knowing that we don’t have everybody there’s still some injured players that we are waiting to come back.” said Bowers

The San Leandro Pirates have not started 3-0 since the 2005 season where the San Leandro Pirates made it all the way to NCS finals but fell short losing to the powerhouse De La Salle Spartans losing 14-0 at the Oakland Coliseum. San Leandro is looking to break that twenty year drought entering Granada. Here’s what rising star sophomore quarterback Devin Martinez has to say heading towards this game.

“I feel that we have had a good week of practice, you know to mention some ups and downs. I mean that always happens, but I feel like that we were definitely prepared for what’s going to happen, and if bad things go wrong, we’re definitely going to rally as a team and come together and come out with a win,” said Martinez.  “Approaching this game, I might not have my star wide receiver Alex Brunson, so probably just going to try to take the game slow, so I’m going to try to take what they give me and see what goes on in the game.”

Everyone has been questioning, have the Pirates really played any real competition yet? The doubters don’t mean anything to Martinez, here’s what he has to say about this, “This win would definitely send a message throughout the league, showing even though they probably think we played nobody since we beat Redwood and Dougherty Valley, I think beating Granada could really send a message to everyone that we are really good competitors out here.”