LAKE COUNTY — It’s the week for match pairs in North Central League I football. Teams with like league records meet on Friday night when sole possession of first place is up for grabs as the Cloverdale Eagles visit the Kelseyville Knights in the Week 7 headliner.
Besides Cloverdale (3-0) at Kelseyville (3-0), the league’s two 2-1 teams — St. Helena and Middletown — square off at Bill Foltmer Field in Middletown – while 1-2 teams Clear Lake and Fort Bragg knock heads at Timberwolf Stadium in Fort Bragg. Also on Friday, the league’s two winless teams, Willits and Lower Lake, both 0-3, collide at Gordon Sadler Field in Lower Lake where the winner will escape the league cellar.
Upper Lake has a league bye and will return to action Oct. 12 at home against Point Arena in NCL III eight-man action.
Here’s a look at the four NCL I games that go under the lights Friday:
Cloverdale at Kelseyville
Both teams are 5-1 overall. Kelseyville has won five straight and the Eagles are working on a three-game winning streak.
“They’re not a surprise at all to us,” Kelseyville coach Erick Larsen said of the Eagles, who are enjoying their best season in years under the direction of first-year coach Greg Alexander. “I’m impressed with his coaching and how he’s come out and has them playing as well as they have.”
Two of the Eagles’ first three league games have been tight ones. They came from behind late in the fourth quarter to upend Fort Bragg 24-19 in their NCL I opener. A week ago at home against Lower Lake, the Eagles’ defense made a last-second stand to turn back the Trojans 27-20. Lower Lake had the ball first-and-goal at the Cloverdale 2-yard line with less than a minute to play.
“They’ve shown they can play four quarters of football,” Larsen said. “They could just as easily be 1-2.”
Kelseyville’s toughest league test to date was last week’s 16-0 home win over the Fort Bragg Timberwolves, a game that was scoreless until the fourth quarter. The Timberwolves were able to slow down the Knights’ powerful running game by putting 10 men in the box and daring Kelseyville to pass the ball.
“I’m sure they’ll load up the box,” Larsen said of the Eagles. “That’s what we’re expecting. We’ve got a few tricks up our sleeves if they do.”
Cloverdale’s defense is similar to Fort Bragg’s in its physical style of play, according to Larsen.
“They have four linemen who are solid,” Larsen said. “Their linebackers are pretty tough and their safeties come up and play the run well.”
Cloverdale’s offense figures to present Kelseyville with more problems than Fort Bragg’s because of its spread formation.
“They spread everyone out and run underneath them,” Larsen said. “They try to create one-on-one situations and try to take advantage of them. They will force us to tackle in the open field.”
Kelseyville will have real leverage in the NCL I race if it beats Cloverdale. The Knights already own wins over St. Helena, Middletown and Fort Bragg, with games remaining against Lower Lake (0-3), Willits (0-3) and Clear Lake (1-2). Cloverdale closes its league schedule with Clear Lake, St. Helena (2-1) and Middletown (2-1).
“It’s a great test for us to see where we’re at,” Larsen said of the Eagles.
St. Helena at Middletown
The winner of St. Helena-Middletown will be no worse than one game behind the winner of Kelseyville-Cloverdale, which means in the thick of the league race. The loser is all but mathematically eliminated.
“They’re just a well-coached team,” Middletown head coach Bill Foltmer said of the Saints and their talented head coach Brandon Farrell. “They run a mixture of formations. They’ll give you veer and some Delaware Wing-T. They’ve moved the ball against everybody but everyone’s moved the ball against them. We’re evenly matched teams.
“Both of us have a good idea what the other is going to do,” Foltmer said of his St. Helena counterpart.
Injuries continue to take a toll on the Middletown offensive line as starter Chris Fischer is out for the season with a broken ankle, an injury he had been playing with each of the last two weeks.
“He’s a starting guard and defensive tackle, so that hurts us quite a bit,” Foltmer said of the third Middletown starting lineman to be lost to injury this season.
“We thought he had sprained the ankle and we kept waiting for the pain to go away,” Foltmer said. “He had it checked out and it was broken.”
While preparing for the Saints, Foltmer said the Mustangs’ scout squad has struggled to adequately simulate what St. Helena runs.
“I’m a little disappointed in the scout squad,” Foltmer said. “For some reason we’ve struggled with that all season. It doesn’t allow us to be as prepared as we should be.”
Both teams enter play 4-2 overall as well as tied for third place in the league standings.
Clear Lake at Fort Bragg
Darius Ford will make his second straight start at quarterback for the Clear Lake Cardinals as Chris White continues to recover from an ankle injury.
“He’s out at least another week,” Clear Lake head coach Mark Cory said of White.
Ford performed admirably in the the Cardinals’ 21-6 home loss to the Middletown Mustangs a week ago, however, he won’t be able to hand the ball off to running back Roman Uribe this week. Uribe was lost for the season on Tuesday when he sustained a broken collar bone in practice during a non-contact drill, almost at the end of the team’s practice.
“He tripped and fell backward onto his shoulder,” Cory said. “It was really a freak deal.”
On all the injuries that have plagued the Cardinals so far this season, Cory said, “It’s like a puzzle every week. You put it together with the pieces you have left.”
Two players do return from the injured list this week. Fullback/safety Erik Valadez and linebacker/strong safety Felix Salinas have been cleared to suit up against the Timberwolves, who provided the Kelseyville Knights with all they could handle last Friday in a 16-0 loss at Kelseyville.
“They’re a big football team and they’ve had a couple of near misses so far,” Cory said of Fort Bragg’s league-opening 24-19 loss to Cloverdale and last week’s setback to Kelseyville, a game that was scoreless until the fourth quarter.
“They were right there with Kelseyville and actually moved the ball against them,” Cory said.
The Timberwolves put 10 men in the box on defense to slow down Kelseyville’s running game and Cory said he wouldn’t be surprised to see them do the same thing against the Cardinals, who have thrown the ball very little this season.
“I expect to see a lot of guys on the line of scrimmage,” Cory said.
Clear Lake’s coach said he expects the Cardinals to give the Timberwolves a competitive game.
“We’ve been competitive but haven’t been able to get over the hump,” he said. “This week is going to be the week to do that.”
After the Fort Bragg game, the Cardinals’ remaining league opponents are Cloverdale, Lower Lake and Kelseyville.
“All the teams we play the rest of the way are pretty good, being with tonight’s game,” Cory said.
Willits at Lower Lake
The Lower Lake Trojans nearly picked up their first win a week ago in a heartbreaking 27-20 loss at Cloverdale, but a long drive near the end of the game stalled out on downs when a fourth-and-goal pass from Elijah Hernandez fell incomplete in the end zone with 14 seconds remaining.
While there are no officially posted odds for high school games, the Trojans would most certainly be the favorite if there were. The Wolverines are 0-6 on the season and didn’t come close to winning their first three league games against Clear Lake, Cloverdale and St. Helena.
While the Trojans have yet to crack the league win column, you certainly can’t fault the passing game led by Hernandez and his top two receivers, Darian James and Diego Gonzalez. Hernandez is on pace to not only beat the county’s single-season passing record (2,196 yards), but shatter it. He enters play against Willits with 1,792 yards and 14 touchdowns, both county bests this season.
James and Gonzalez each have 29 receptions and nearly the same yardage totals – James has 555 yards to 554 for Gonzalez. They’ve combined for 12 TD receptions.
