It's not the first full week of the prep football season, but it's more than a few games here or there. Forty percent of the schools are in action this week. For East Valley partisans, 23 schools in the area begin their 2016 campaigns in what's known as zero week. We'll refer to it as Week 1 in the first edition of Football Walk Through. The emphasis in this space generally will be East Valley schools.

EAST VALLEY GAMES: Westview (No. 10 6A) at Basha (No. 8 6A); Queen Creek (No. 6 5A) at Cesar Chavez; Highland at Corona del Sol; Boulder Creek at Hamilton (No. 1 6A); Mesa at Mesquite; Sandra Day O'Connor at Mountain Pointe (No. 3 6A); Desert Vista (No. 9 6A) at Perry; Chandler (No. 4 6A) at Red Mountain; Skyline (No. 7 6A) at Westwood; Williams Field (No. 5 5A) at Arcadia; Agua Fria at Campo Verde; Casteel at Globe; San Tan Foothills (No. 10 2A) at San Manuel; Seton at Apache Junction; Estrella Foothills (No. 9 4A) at Tempe, Benjamin Franklin at Arizona Leadership Academy (No. 7 3A), Chandler Prep vs. Mohave Accelerated. 

NON-EAST VALLEY GAMES: Alhambra at Carl Hayden, Cibola at Horizon, Trevor Browne at Kofa, Maryvale at South Mountain, Camelback at Betty Fairfax, Goldwater at North Canyon, Shadow Ridge at Notre Dame Prep, Paradise Valley (No. 4 5A)  at Verrado (No. 9 5A), Maricopa at Willow Canyon, Junipero Serra (Calif.) at Saguaro (No. 1 4A), Salpointe (No. 5 4A) at St. Mary's, Dysart at Youngker, Page at Blue Ridge (No. 9 3A), Safford at Payson (No. 10 3A), Coolidge at River Valley (No. 6 3A), Florence at Santa Rita, Tuba City at Snowflake (No. 1 3A), Phoenix Christian (No. 8 2A) at Alchesay, Pima at Miami, Glendale Prep at Scottsdale Christian (No 5 2A), Thatcher (No. 6 2A) at Willcox; Mayer vs. Greyhills Academy at Williams HS; Ray at St. David, Valley Union vs. Bagdad at Chandler Prep, Baboquivari at Trivium Prep Academy.

SOLLENBERGER CLASSIC (Saturday Aug. 20 at Coconino HS): Brophy Prep (No. 6 6A) vs. Pinnacle (No. 5 6A) at 1 p.m. and Centennial (No. 2 5A) vs. Desert Edge(No. 1 5A) at 6 p.m.

THIS AND THAT: Four of the East Valley teams playing their openers do so with a new coach. Corona del Sol, with interim head coach Richard Mettlach (an assistant last year), plays host to Highland. Mesa High visits Mesquite with both schools featuring new bosses. Mesa High alum Kapi Sikahema debuts for the Jackrabbits vs. Mesquite and Chad DeGrenier, who shifted from Mesa Mtn. View after five seasons. In the small-school ranks San Tan Foothills, sporting new mentor Ritchie Martin, makes the trip to San Manuel.

All five traditional Chandler district high schools are in action (Basha, Chandler, Hamilton, Perry and Casteel). Casteel is new to the varsity ranks with sophomores and freshmen only. Spencer Stowers, a Mesquite High alum, started the program last year with freshmen after a three-year varsity stint guiding Westwood. Casteel is confident, despite not having upperclassmen, it will compete out of the gate at the 3A level.

Queen Creek coach Travis Schureman and assistant Joe Germaine played at Mountain View in 1992 and 1993 when current Cesar Chavez coach Jim Rattay was guiding arch-rival Mesa High in the first of his four head-coaching stops in Arizona.

It's unusual for teams to play a region game in the season opener, but that's the case with Skyline-Westwood (6A East Valley), Highland-Corona del Sol (6A Central), Camelback-Betty Fairfax (5A Union) and Benjamin Franklin-American Leadership Academy (3A Central). 

Among the things to watch this week: How Basha QB Ryan Kelley fares given the fanfare he's received as an ASU commit and on the flipside how Basha's defense performs against a very good Westview offense. How new starting QBs at 6A powers Hamilton, Chandler and Mountain Pointe present themselves.  How Saguaro performs against California power Serra HS, a program with 11 straight winning seasons. Serra played and defeated Desert Ridge three years ago in a tight contest.

Note -- Rankings are from Sollenberger's Az Prep Football Report  published earlier this month.