2008 Football Season Preview??glendale College:

GLENDALE — Between a coaching staff rich in Vaqueros history and an expansive array of homegrown talent, the 2008 Glendale Community College football team is certainly keeping the “Community” in GCC.

While first-year Coach John Rome estimates he’s just about the only coach on his staff who didn’t once wear the Vaquero uniform, he’s got a strong background in the program, having served as offensive coordinator for the last six years under former Coach John Cicuto, who resigned following the 2007 season after 19 years at the helm.

Rome is also quick to note the amount of talent from local high schools — spanning the area that includes Glendale, Burbank, La Crescenta and La Cañada-Flintridge — that the current team will rely on in part as it seeks to navigate the Northern Conference’s National Division and return to a bowl game, a goal that it narrowly missed in 2007, going 6-4 and 5-2 in the Western State Conference Pacific Division.

“All these kids come from probably no more than a half-hour drive from here and we like it that way,” said Rome, whose squad features 24 true locals in all this year, up from 17 last season. “We want these guys home at night and we want the support of the parents.

“We want this to be a community college. ...This is our college for our kids here and we take a lot of pride in that and in being able to transfer the kind of kids that we do.”

Perhaps nowhere is the Vaqueros’ local recruiting coup as evident as it is in the backfield.

The team’s stable of running backs going into its season opener on today at West L.A. College reads like an area high school all-star game roster.

Burbank High graduate Jason McNeill is back after sitting out the previous season and will look to bounce back to his 2006 form, when he was named the team’s most valuable player. New to the team this year are Also coming off impressive high school careers are 2008 Bellarmine-Jefferson graduate Jorge Chaidez, whose 4,861 career rushing yards are a Burbank-area high school record, and Joe Wiggan, who was Pacific League Player of the Year, All-Area Player of the Year and an All-CIF Central Division selection as a senior at Burroughs in 2006.

Glendale’s Malcolm Roberson, an All-Pacific League second-team selection who rushed for 951 yards last year, is another freshman addition to the backfield.