The Millikan Football program has made a habit of putting together competitive schedules against some of the most talented teams in the area, and this fall will be no exception.
With the changes coming to Moore League Football–and Cabrillo and Compton headed to the associated Hub City League–there’s two extra Friday nights for head coach Romeo Pellum to use to challenge his team, and he’s put together the most consistently challenging slate of his tenure with the Rams.
“Let’s go see what we’re made of,” said Pellum of Millikan’s 2026 schedule. “We’ll be challenged early, we’ll be challenged often; so I think that’ll help us for league, with our league getting better. With Poly being a Division 2-3 program, Wilson was Division 4 last year, everyone else is around that Division 3 range. I know we’re fired up, we’re on our get back tour.”
It was a frustrating 2025 season for the Rams, who finished with a 3-8 record after two of their non-league wins were vacated due to CIF-SS infractions. The season ended in the first round of the Division 5 playoffs with a heartbreaking one-point loss at Aliso Niguel.
This year’s schedule lays out differently for Millikan, with their bye week coming in the middle of the schedule (Sept. 18) instead of the final week, as has been the case the past two years.
“It’s good going into the playoffs with a game,” Pellum explained. “The last two years coming off a bye, we weren’t hitting, there was no contact. We’re excited, man, let’s just put it that way. We’ve got to get back to our ways and our roots of winning, and back to the culture that we had to get us from Division 9 to Division 3.”
Millikan will open the season at DeHaven Stadium with a Thursday game, Aug. 20, against Huntington Beach. They’ll then hit the road for a pair of rematches from a season ago–at Loyola on Aug. 28 and at Downey on Sept. 4.
The Rams will be back home to take on Capistrano Valley on Sept. 11, then take their bye before hosting Sherman Oaks Notre Dame on Sept. 25. Millikan’s final non-league game will be a road trip to Palos Verdes on Oct. 22.
As Pellum points out, nearly the entire schedule was in a similar playoff bracket to the Rams last season, and all six of their non-league games will be against teams from Division 2-5 in last year’s CIF-SS playoffs.
The Rams open a condensed Moore League slate against rivals Lakewood on Oct. 9, then host Jordan for Homecoming on Oct. 16. Senior Night will be against Long Beach Poly on Oct. 23, and then the Rams will take on the defending Moore League champs with a trip to Wilson on the final Friday night of the season.
2026 Millikan Rams Football Schedule:
8/20 – vs. Huntington Beach
8/28 – at Loyola
9/4 – at Downey
9/11 – vs. Capistrano Valley
9/18 – BYE
9/25 – vs. Sherman Oaks Notre Dame
10/2 – at Palos Verdes
10/9 – at Lakewood*
10/16 – vs. Jordan*
10/23 – vs. Long Beach Poly*
10/30 – at Wilson*
*Denotes Moore League game
