Note: The No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco game has been postponed to 7 p.m. PT Saturday night due to rain and lightning. It’s the latest sign that the apocalypse is upon us . . . or perhaps it isn’t even surprising. With the biggest national high school football matchup in at least two years on the schedule Friday night in Southern California, an online sportsbook has established a betting line and is taking wagers on winners and the point spread. RELATED: A glance at No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco | Top players to watch in No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco Here’s the crazy thing: The clash between USA TODAY Super 25 No. 1 Mater Dei (Santa Ana, Calif.) and No. 2 St. John Bosco (Bellflower, Calif.) isn’t the first time a high school game has attracted betting interest. In fact, it’s not even the only betting line offered for high school games Friday night. There are five currently on the table, from games in Georgia and Western Pennsylvania on the East coast to Washington and Southern California in the west. The site providing the point spreads for high school matchups is 5 Dimes (5Dimes.eu), a Costa Rica-based online sportsbook and casino that offers betting lines on all traditional sports — NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, European soccer, boxing, MMA, tennis, auto racing — and less traditional fare such as volleyball, chess, snooker (think billiards with a British accent) and, yes, even competitive eating. American high school football falls somewhere in between. The site normally doesn’t post a betting line unless a game is televised on a local network. If the game is on TV and there is enough interest, 5Dimes often creates a line for it. Naturally, No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco fits those descriptions. The teams are traditional Southern California rivals — they’re separated by just a half hour of pavement — ensuring the game would be on local television regardless of their rankings (in this case, it’s on Fox Sports’ regional network). Both schools have emerged as tremendous feeders of top collegiate and professional football talent — Arizona Cardinals quarterback Josh Rosen played at St. John Bosco and USC freshman passer J.T. Daniels is from Mater Dei — which brings additional attention and eyeballs . . . and maybe additional wagering. As of 1:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Mater Dei was a 10.5-point favorite on 5Dimes, an increase of one point from the line posted just after midnight. Percy, the Casino Bonuses and Wagering issues Manager at 5Dimes, refused to disclose his surname and would not provide details about what inspired such a shift, stating only that one of his lines managers determined it was justified. Traditional betting movement of that sort would indicate some significant sum was placed on Mater Dei as a 9.5-point favorite, which would inspire the line manager to push the expected spread higher to elicit more money being placed on St. John Bosco, thus leveling some of the financial risk facing the sportsbook. By comparison, Western Pennsylvania power Pine-Richland High School is currently a 34.5-point favorite against Mt. Lebanon in the week’s widest line, while Atlanta-area rivalry Archer vs. Grayson is currently a push (pick ’em). While he was unavailable for comment both on a previous broader story on high school sports gambling and for this piece, 5Dimes founder Tony Williams spoke to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review in 2011, insisting that neither he nor his customers had moral qualms about offering point spreads on high school games. “The customers who bet the games don’t have a problem with morality. If the customers are happy, I am happy,” he said. RELATED: The odds of sports betting affecting high school sports are slim The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS), on the other hand, is not happy. As legalized gambling has advanced, the NFHS has made clear it does not approve of any gambling on its events in sanctioned sportsbooks. So far, New Jersey, Delaware, Mississippi and West Virginia have all fallen in line with that proclamation, abstaining from taking any action on local prep sports. Nevada never has. Rhode Island, New York and Pennsylvania all have had bills pass their state legislatures that would legalize sports gambling, though when (and if) they introduce gambling remains to be seen. Yet on a national level, games with the profile and pizazz of No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco will continue to generate excitement and attention, which will inspire some to look for a place to wager on the outcome. In Costa Rica, 5Dimes’ website is open for business.<doc-sep>Kickoff is slated for 7:30 p.m. PDT at Santa Ana Stadium in Santa Ana. As of Thursday morning, tickets were still being sold through Mater Dei's ticket provider Prime Ticket (available nationally for those with DirecTV, Dish Network, Sling TV or PlayStation Vue) will broadcast the game while streaming will be available via the FOX Sports App. For those not able to get a ticket to Friday's high school football showdown between No. 1 St. John Bosco (Bellflower, Calif.) and No. 2 Mater Dei (Santa Ana, Calif.) , there are television and streaming options.The two teams will put nearly 50 FBS recruits on the field Friday night, including the top two junior quarterbacks in the country.<doc-sep>
Note: The No. 1 Mater Dei vs. No. 2 St. John Bosco game has been postponed to 7 p.m. PT Saturday night due to rain and lightning. No matter how you cut it, Friday night’s meeting of Super 25 No. 1 Mater Dei (Santa Ana, Calif.) and No. 2 St. John Bosco (Bellflower, Calif.) is among the best we’ve seen this decade. Just the school names alone bring to mind great football teams of recent vintage. These two programs, however, did not get to be the nation’s best on reputation alone. The young men wearing Mater Dei’s wings and Bosco’s spears on their respective helmets have earned the right to be considered among the best players in California, if not the nation. In total, the 247 Sports Composite lists … wait for it … 45 players between the two schools. That’s right – there are more ranked recruits than if you made up a starting offense and a starting defense for each side. Here, you can see 247Sports’ rankings of the Calif. Class of 2019, 2020 and 2021. As you can see, there’s a heavy dose of talent across the Golden State, but a healthy portion of those players attend school in either Santa Ana or Bellflower. The breakdown goes like this: Bosco has 25 ranked players to Mater Dei’s 20. In the Class of 2019, Bosco has 15 recruits ranked, while Mater Dei has 12. For the junior class, Bosco has the edge, 9-8. And in 2021, Bosco receiver Beaux Collins is the lone ranked player from either side, at No. 5 in the state. But while Bosco may have the edge on total ranked recruits, the Monarchs have the slight edge in terms of top-tier talent, as seen by one of the country’s premier recruiting services. Mater Dei has six players (seniors Bru McCoy and Oregon commit Mase Funa; juniors Elias Ricks, USC commit Bryce Young, Myles Murao and Oklahoma commit Darion Green-Warren) who are among the state’s top 12 players in their class, per the 247 Sports Composite. Meanwhile, Bosco has three such players (senior USC commit Chris Steele, junior DJ Uiagalelei and Collins, a sophomore. Someday, we will see many a player from Friday night’s epic tilt doing work on Saturdays in the fall and, perhaps, Sundays. For now, we can simply marvel at the amount of talent Mater Dei head coach Bruce Rollinson and St. John Bosco head coach Jason Negro have brought into their programs. It’s no small feat, and the clash of talented titans should make for a memorable matchup.