Football Preview Week IV

Despite rumors of retirement the mystery ref was spotted working the Fremot/Ludington game last week

By Ken De Laat

Week 3 is in the books and our local teams are having mixed success this far. Fremont stumbled in their conference opener against a surprisingly explosive Oriole offense who have put up 97 points the last 2 games. Speaking of the Lakes division, Manistee stayed undefeated with a win over Oakridge on the Eagle home turf, no easy feat, to put themselves in the title race. At least until they face Whitehall in 2 weeks.
In the Rivers division Hart and North Muskegon are each undefeated on the season and 1-0 in the division, but don’t go to sleep on Ravenna who despite a pair of early losses will undoubtedly compete for the crown.
In the CSAA Tri County looks even better than last season. The win over Reed City up in Coyote country was huge and while Coach Butler will never let his team look ahead of the next game, you can bet the matchup with the Cardinals in early October is etched on a few calendars.BR and RC play this week.Kent City started 2-0 then got stuffed in their home field last week. Can the Cloud snap a lengthy losing streak to the Eagles?
 

Grant at Fremont
Two long time rivals who both need a win to pull even on the season.
The Tigers are playing away from home for the fourth straight game and have struggled with keeping teams other than Kelloggsville out of the endzone. Fremont had no answers for an Oriole team that seemed to score whenever they wanted to. If Reichert-Slater finds Hertel a few times and Noordyk pounds the line on the ground it could be a rough night for the Tigers. Grant has scored on big plays and special teams. They’ll need to put together a few lengthy drives to keep their defense from spending so much time on the field. Look for Tiger Obenauf to attract a lot of Packer attention.

Kent City at White Cloud
The Cloud hasn’t beaten the Eagles on the gridiron since 1996 when both competed in the old NCAA Conference. That’s been 11 games and they haven’t kept a Kent City team under 50 points since 2015. The Eagles started out with a pair of wins but last week the Bucks of Buchanan controlled  the KC offense most of the night. Coach Trice and his staff will likely see a lot of film of that one in preparation for Friday. It will be a big crowd and it will take a big game from a number of Indian players on both sides of the ball to pull off a win over their visitors. McGowen has been productive on both sides of the ball, Stockwell, Graham and the Indian D will be tasked with keeping the game from being a catchup affair.

Tri County at Newaygo
The Vikings are steaming hot right now. They have averaged over 40 points a game and have simply outscored opponents. TC has  a title on their agenda and don’t want to stumble on the wayThe Lions got off the schneid with a convincing win over Morley but there are still more mistakes on the field than Coach Munger would like. It will be imperative that they minimize the kind of errors the Vikings have been feasting on early this season if they are going to give themselves a chance in this one,

Hesperia at North Muskegon
The Panthers are facing one of the top teams in the conference on the road. The Norse knocked off perennial powerhouse Pewamo-Westphalia then whipped Muskegon Catholic and Mason County Central.
Hope to see Hesperia fare well but NM has far too much talent on the field to believe an upset is imminent.

Holton at Mason County Central
The Spartans don’t score much but the Devils are barely scoring at all. Looks to be a rough year for Holton with a schedule that's not getting any easier.

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