Top 5 high school football games of the week
Sep. 28—It's the latter half of a high school football season that has felt like it's gone by way too quick. There's now a better idea of how good teams are and pictures have become clearer about which schools will find themselves at the top of their respective conferences.
Here are the top five high school football games of the week.
Logos at Potlatch, 7 p.m. Friday
There are four games left in the season, but the race for the Whitepine League Division I crown might be decided on Friday. The two teams that share first-place in the conference — the Potlatch Loggers and Logos Knights of Moscow — will play to determine who stands atop the rest of the pack.
At this time last year, both teams were at very different places. Potlatch (4-0, 3-0) beat Logos (5-0, 4-0) to improve to 4-1 on the season, then dropped its final three games and was out of the Idaho Class 1A Division I state tournament. The Knights, who were only in their second year as a football program, only won one more game after falling to the Loggers and finished with a 3-6 record.
"Being new to this position, it's definitely different," Logos coach Nick Holloway said. "The last two years we've been fighting and clawing to grow into maturity and become a better team and to be in a position where we're 5-0 and could really push to doing well in the playoffs and going further."
Both programs have their differences — namely the time of tenures between Holloway and Potlatch coach Ryan Ball, but there are similarities, too.
Friday's game features arguably the two best quarterbacks the Whitepine League has to offer in Knights' quarterback Jack Driskill and Loggers' quarterback Jack Clark. The two P1FCU Prep Athlete of the Week winners have led their teams to huge scores with both their arms and legs. Despite the All-State level showings of both signal-callers, Ball and Holloway believe defense will be the difference Friday. More specifically, which defense will be able to better contain either Driskill or Clark.
"We've got to control Driskill," Ball said. "He's a heck of a player — so that's not any easy thing to do. (Logos') offense runs through him, so you got to control him the best you can. Once you do that — then you have an opportunity to win."
Containing either quarterback is a tall order — but there has to be a winner. Regardless of whether it's Potlatch or Logos — the game will have a lot of eyes on it both in person and from the rest of the Whitepine League.
Moscow at Lewiston, 7 p.m. Friday
The penultimate quad-city game of the season will take place at Bengal Field on Friday when the 1-4 Moscow Bears take on the 2-3 Lewiston Bengals.
Both teams are looking for that season-defining or momentum-building win going into conference play. Talent is not the question for either squad, but neither have found the desired results. Whoever wins will have bragging rights along the 30-mile stretch of US-95, but will also have proof of concept that they can beat a solid team.
"Lewiston is always a tough task for us," Moscow coach Rob Bafus said. "We saw them this summer in 7-on-7 quite a bit and a little bit at Vandal Camp. We know what we're going to get from them. They're going to try to run the ball on us. ... They're well coached, they're disciplined, they'll be coming out and they'll be playing fast."
Friday's game will be matchup of running vs. passing offenses. Lewiston's bread and butter this season has been toting the rock via running back Jackson Lathen. Moscow's success has been through the arm of the passing attack provided by quarterback Noah Velasco.
The threat Lathen provides has allowed the Bengals to have quick scoring opportunities in play action and he has allowed them to control the clock. They will have added motivation with Friday's game being homecoming.
To counter that, Bafus and the Bears have preached to Velasco in practice to be patient and rely on the short passing game for better efficiency — which can also open up the run game for Moscow should Lewiston become too keyed-in on the opposing receivers.
The Bears will need to contain the Bengals' running game with a depleted defense that is missing players due to injuries and illnesses.
"We expect to see multiple different formations — a little bit of trickery in their formations," Bafus said. "... that's something we've really been focusing on lately is getting our eyes correct."
Garfield-Palouse at Liberty Christian, 3 p.m. Saturday (Kamiakin High School)
The Garfield-Palouse Vikings have impressed the whole season. Just a year after the football team returned from a three-year hiatus and went 1-8, Garfield-Palouse (3-1, 3-1) is coming off a 62-0 win over a Sunnyside Christian team that won seven games a season ago. The Vikings have another big test ahead of them this week against last season's Washington 1B Southeast champions — the Liberty Christian Patriots of Richland, Wash.
The Patriots prevailed 62-6 last year, but will face a much different team this season.
Garfield-Palouse coach Garrett Parrish had just one player play both offense and defense last week against Sunnyside Christian — and now there's proof of concept the method works.
The Patriots are in a better position to counter that method than the Knights were. Liberty Christian has 28 players listed on its roster (according to MaxPreps) compared to 17 on Sunnyside Christian's.
But the Vikings don't need a shutout win against the Patriots — they just need to win. And if Garfield-Palouse comes out with the decision on Saturday — the discussion will turn from whether or not it can hang with the top dogs in the conference to who they'll face come state playoffs.
Prairie at Kamiah, 7 p.m. Friday
Clearwater Valley coach Allen Hutchens said last week that the Whitepine League might have four teams this season in the Idaho Class 1A Division I playoffs. If that does end up being the case, then Friday's game between the Prairie Pirates of Cottonwood and the Kamiah Kubs will be one of the most important games of the season in the conference.
Kamiah and Prairie both have 3-1 overall and 2-1 league records and are third and fourth, respectively, in the conference behind Logos and Potlatch. Lapwai is not far behind either squad with a 2-2 overall record and a 1-2 league record.
Both teams have the offenses and the defenses to put together a competitive showing against the other.
Pirates quarterback Noah Behler is coming off arguably his best game of the season after scoring all six of his team's touchdowns in a shutout win against Genesee. Kubs quarterback David Kludt accounted for five scores of his own in a shutout win against Clearwater Valley.
Similar to the game between the Loggers and Knights — this game will come down to which defense can better contain the opposing signal-caller.
Chewelah at Asotin, 7 p.m. Friday
The Asotin Panthers are looking at a must-win situation to stay alive in the Washington Northeast 2B race against the Chewelah Cougars on Friday.
Asotin (2-2, 1-1) started the year at a promising 2-0 but has since dropped two straight against Morton and Northwest Christian. Chewelah (2-2, 2-1) is also looking to get back on track after falling to .500 last week against Okanogan.
The biggest obstacle for the Panthers the past couple weeks has been finishing out drives. They have been able to start games strong and keep contests in hand through the first quarter or first half — but failed to close out.
The Cougars have faced a similar problem in their losses.
Asotin has an opportunity to flip the script against Chewelah and start fast early. If it does that, then the Panthers will find themselves in a better position for the rest of a daunting schedule that still includes games against Reardan and Lind-Ritzville/Sprague.
Kowatsch can be contacted at 208-848-2268, tkowatsch@lmtribune.com or on Twitter @Teren_Kowatsch.
