2A /1A Football preview capsules by one of the best
Jordan Nailon / Blast Zone Media
R.A. Long working hard to retool for 2A GSHL run
The Lumberjacks of recent vintage have had to learn the hard way a concept that their forefathers never paused to consider; lineman don’t grow on trees.
This season, though, the R.A. Long football team is looking a little taller and a littler thicker in the trenches. Most importantly, the Jacks have added more more trees to their forest, which they hope will help to keep hearts and minds and legs and lungs fresh in crunch time.
“I feel like I’ve got about 9 to 10 varsity ready bigs that I can rotate through,” RAL head coach Jon Barker said. “That should help us late in games.”
Now in his fifth year calling the shots for the Lumberjacks, and coming off a 1-8 campaign in 2023, Barker spent the entire offseason with his mind wide open to changes throughout the program. Barker says the Jacks were set to enter Week 1 action with about 50 players on the roster, but precious few of them will be returning to the positions astute RAL fans will remember them in.
First and foremost among those changes will be senior TraMayne Jenkins moving from quarterback to slotback. Jenkins, a bruising force to be reckoned with on both sides of the ball, started last season under center for the Jacks before suffering a season-ending injury under a heavy workload.
“We’re trying to have him be a little bit smarter with what he does with his body,” Barker noted.
After Jenkins went down with his injury last fall, Nick Niday stepped up to play quarterback for the Jacks but even he will be in a new position this season. For at least the first series of the season Niday will be lining up as a wideout. From there, much is yet to be determined for the R.A. Long
This season the Lumberjacks are set to start junior Jaxson Rivenes under center in Week 1. He and Niday split time as QB1 during the spring and summer workouts.
Taijon Reagins is another player with some time taking the snaps. After snapping his clavicle last fall the senior is likely going to spend most of his time as a hybrid back this season, while also moving into a linebacker spot.
The defense will hinge on the play of senior Franklin Pihl. The Jacks’ middle linebacker found himself in the middle of most of the action last season and he’s looking forward to bringing his bruising style to the full back spot in his spare time.
“We’re going to lean on Franklin Pihl,” Barker noted. “He’s coming back after leading the team in tackles last year.”
Kolby Knudsen, a senior linebacker and running back, along with Devin Harris, a senior outside backer and wide receiver, will also bring experience back to the gridiron for the Jacks.
While the offense will primarily set up in a 2x2 with one in the backfield, the defense is likely to look like a modified 4-2-5.
“When I sold it to the boys I sold is as a 4 by 4, with a one over shell,” Barker said. “It’s more of a nickel back setup than a traditional outside linebacker setup.”
And that crew of linemen tasked with pushing the Jacks in the right direction will be powered by Gage Hintsala, a senior center and defensive end.
“He’s just a little bulldog,” Barker said.
Colby Loghry, a junior offensive tackle and defensive end who a 3A GSHL honorable mention with Heritage last season, will add some beef to the frontline along with junior tackle Colton Stone.
While the Lumberjacks opted not to play a true jamboree in the preseason, they did spend the summer locking horns with Castle Rock and Rainier (Ore.). Since last season the Jacks have seen some changes on the coaching staff and a shift in philosophy toward running the ball in order to more effectively control possession and tempo.
“I feel like we finally have a mindset where we’re all pushing in the same direction,” Barker said. “We played pretty good defense last year. We just played way too much of it way too often.”
Looking around the 2A Greater St. Helens League, Barker sees Ridgefield as the likely favorites for a league title, with Hudson’s Bay next in line. However, he noted that most teams in the league will be starting greenhorn quarterbacks, so there could be some steep learning curves ahead.
Mostly though, the Lumberjacks are focused on themselves and working toward a more competitive run through the 2A GSHL on the way to a Civil War showdown that’s sure to spark renewed interest this season now that a former Lumberjack is running the show at Mark Morris.
“We don’t care who’s not here. We don’t care who’s walking the halls that should be out here. We just care about the guys who out here with us,” Barker said. “We feel pretty good about just putting our head down and putting our nose down.”
R.A. Long will host Castle Rock at Longview Memorial Stadium on Friday at 7 p.m.
R.A. LONG LUMBERJACKS
COACH/YEAR: Jon Barker, 5th
LAST YEAR’S RECORD/FINISH: 1-8
ROSTER NUMBER: ~50
KEY RETURNERS
Franklin Pihl FB/LB
Tra Jenkins Slot/LB
Taijon Reagins Slot/LB
Kolby Knutsen LB/RB
Devin Harris WR/OLB
Gage Hintsala C/DE
OFFENSE: 2x2 with 1 back
DEFENSE: 4-2-5
GAMES TO WATCH
Sept. 6 - vs Castle Rock
Nov. 1 - vs Mark Morris
Beavers back to business to begin the Flanagan era
Since 1995 there’s been just one season where Glen Flanagan hasn’t been on the Woodland Beavers football coaching staff. That season was 2010 and things didn’t go so well, so the dedicated defensive coordinator saw no other option but to return to the sideline.
But this will be the first year that Flanagan is calling all the shots as head coach. He was tabbed for lead headset duty after Sean McDonald left his post to take over the show at Mountain View.. Now Flanagan is ready to call the shots on both sides of the ball, with all the scrutiny that comes with it.
Still, an old defensive hound will always have priorities when it comes to team identity.
“I like to think that defense will be our identity but we hope to also have a dynamic offense,” Flanagan said. “I’ve always believed you win championships with your devise. Offense wins games but defense wins championships at the end of the seasons, hopefully.”
Last season the Beavers won the 2A GSHL while compiling an 8-3 record. That run ended with a road loss to Clarkston in the State playoffs. This year Woodland has 60 players on the roster and they’re intent on defending their league title as a first order of business.
That goal should be within grasp so long as Elijah Andersen, last year’s league MVP, remains healthy. Last season he picked up 2,400 all-purpose yards and scored 30 touchdowns while notching more than 100 tackles. This season the senior do-it-all-dandy will move from running back to quarterback while holding down the safety spot in the defensive secondary.
“It’s not just for offense it’s for his defense, too,” Flanagan said.
This year the Beavers plan to run a spread offense, giving Andersen the ability to pick his best option by putting the ball in the air or keeping it in his own hands if the defense presents a lane to run.
“We’re going to move Eli Andersen all over the place,” Flanagan noted with the chortle of a man holding a full house in his hand.
The offense will be helped out by first team all-league tight end Chase Hall, while Michael Belvin figures to take some snaps as quarterback in order to put Andersen out in space. Karson Northcut is another threat for the Beavers in the backfield after earning second team all-league honors last fall.
“He’s good. He’s really good, actually,” Flanagan said of Northcut. “He’s also really underrated because we have Eli.”
Northcut was also the team defensive MVP last season as a linebacker. Flanagan called him “savvy and athletic” and noted that Northcut, “just gets the job done.”
However, pinning Flanagan down on his preferred defensive set was more difficult than tackling Andersen in the open field.
“I’m way too competitive to be stuck in one defense,” Flanagan said. “I can put multiple players in different spots. So if a team is gouging us in one spot I’m going to make as many changes as it takes to try to stop them.”
Juniors Will Clemens and Zach Young also figure to feature prominently in the Beavers game plans this season. Last fall Clemens started at linebacker and wide receiver, while Young started at corner back and wide receiver.
Charles Elkington, Seth Poppe and Logan Busig figure to provide the bulk of the muscle for the Beavers in the new regime. Elkington and Popp are both senior defensive ends who double down on the offensive line. Meanwhile, Busig was an All-League defensive tackle last season.
“We have a lot of two way starters so we are not real deep,” Flanagan admitted.
The Beavers sent all three of their teams (varsity, JV and freshman) to Kelso for a preseason jamboree last week and played short contests against W.F. West and the host Hilanders. Following that experiment in controlled chaos, Flanagan came away with mixed emotions.
“As a head coach, you’re never satisfied. Even as a defensive coordinator I was never satisfied,” he said. “If we can take care of the ball and stay disciplined we should be able to compete with a lot of teams.”
When it comes to picking out a league favorite this fall, Flanagan didn’t stutter before listing Ridgefield as the frontrunners. He noted that rumors put the Spudders’ roster number around 120 players.
“They’ll be a 3A school before they’re a 4A school, I think, since it’s a four year count,” Flanagan noted, before tabbing Hudson’s Bay as the next most likely contender for the 2A GSHL crown.
First, the Beavers will open their campaign with a refurbished rendition of the 8-Mile War. With Kalama moving up to the 1A ranks this season, Woodland will hit the road north to play Week 1 up on the hill against a Chinooks team that’s looking to prove it can hang with the big boys.
As for the Beavers, they’ll be looking to prove they haven’t lost their bite in the offseason.
WOODLAND BEAVERS
COACH/YEAR: Glen Flanagan, 1st
LAST YEAR’S RECORD/FINISH: 8-3
ROSTER NUMBER: 60
KEY RETURNERS
Elijah Andersen, QB/Safety
Kassen Northcut, LB/RB
Charles Elkinton, OL/DE
Seth Popp, OL/DE
Logan Busig, DT/OL
Chase Hall, TE/DB
Will Clemens, LB/WR
Zach Young, CB/WR
OFFENSE: Spread
DEFENSE: Multi-front
GAMES TO WATCH
Oct. 25 - at Mark Morris
Nov. 1 - vs Ridgefield
Rockets making adjustments in run for Trico crown
In his second year at the helm for Castle Rock football Cody Warner eager to see if a few tweaks to the operating system can lift the Rockets to heights they haven’t seen in years.
Last year the Rockets finished with a record of 4-6 after dropping a heartbreaker on the road by a score of 15-14 in the first round of the playoffs at Eatonville. This year they’ve got 55 players out to help power their push for a league title and a deeper run in the postseason.
The changes will start with the offense, where the Rockets will move to a spread set with some “squeeze formations” mixed in where they line up in tight stacks off the tackles. That system, which relies more on zone blocking than pulling linemen, has also been implemented in the youth and middle school programs during the offseason and will be a marked departure from the pistol offense that has powered Castle Rock in the past.
“I’ve always enjoyed the wide zone running schemes you see with the 49ers and different college teams,” Warner noted. “It’s been a lot of work but I felt like that was a big missing component.”
Key to that operation will be Trevor Rogen, who is set to return to quarterback. Owen Langdon will also return to his spot at wide receiver, while Noah Shulke will be back on the offensive line. Wyatt Orth will also provide some experience as a running back, although injuries tried to derail his campaign last fall.
The defense also underwent an overhaul while fans turned their attention to other sports.
“It’s going to be a little different than we’ve been in the past. We used to be a 3-3 stack and now we’re going to beg more of a 4-2-5 look,” Warner noted. “We’ve got some good size lineman that we think can do some good things for us with two linebackers keeping things clean in the middle.”
Those linebackers will include Orth, Langdon and Thatcher Heller, while Shulke will once again be in the thick of the fight in the trenches. Rogen will slot in again as a cornerback and Logan Engkraf will return to his spot at safety in the secondary.
Owen Keatley is a junior who is primed to breakout after spending a season backlogged behind upperclassmen on the line last season. As for newcomers to the gridiron at The Rock, freshman Sam Smith is expected to help hold the line as a defensive tackle.
The Rockets played a preseason jamboree last week against Toledo and Rainier (Ore.), and it was an opportunity for everyone to reset their sights after keeping their heads down to do the dirty work of overhauling systems on both sides of the ball.
“I don’t know if we learned anything new, I’d say it was a good opportunity to get out the jitters,” Warner said. “Our first five plays were atrocious on offense, guys just had a little too much juice.”
But as much as the Rockets would like to see themselves in the final conversation for top honors in the 1A Trico League this season, they know they’re going to have to fight their way up the pecking order.
“It’s not that hard to talk about who’s earned the right to be at the top in the preseason and that’s La Center,” Warner said. “We haven’t been able to knock them off yet and you’re still king of the hill until somebody knocks you off, in my opinion.”
Warner added Seton Catholic to the list of heavyweights in the Trico, and noted that the addition of Kalama to the league from the 2B ranks will add another level of intrigue with an old rivalry renewed.
Before all that, though, the Rockets will take their new-look show on the road for a Week 1 date at R.A. Long on Friday. This will be the third year in a row the teams have faced off to open the season.
“I get along well with their coach Jon Barker, he does a great job with everyone who does down there,” Warner said. “They beat us last year, they got a few big plays that got us, and then we weren’t able to push the ball across the end zone at the end. Hopefully we’ll be able to get by them this year and go up 2-1 in the series.”
CASTLE ROCK ROCKETS
COACH/YEAR: Cody Warner, 2nd
LAST YEAR’S RECORD/FINISH: 4-6
ROSTER NUMBER: 55
KEY RETURNERS
Trevor Rogen, QB/CB
Owen Langdon, WR/OLB
Noah Shulke, OL/DL
Wyatt Orth, ILB/RB
Logan Engkraf, Safety
Thatcher Heller, OLB
OFFENSE: Spread
DEFENSE: 4-2-5
GAMES TO WATCH
Sept. 6 - at R.A. Long
Nov. 1 - vs Kalama
‘Nooks ready to reintroduce themselves to the Trico
Kalama is not planning for any slow to its roll after moving up a classification to join the 1A Trico League. Last year the Chinooks put up a record of 8-4, including an undefeated mark in the Central 2B League (South Division), before falling to Onalaska in the State quarterfinals.
A new school enrollment count pushed the ‘Nooks up in the ranks in the offseason, and with a dozen seniors gone from last year’s squad it will be a tall (but not impossible) order to maintain the winning tradition Kalama fans have become so accustomed to.
“It’s a lot more games that count for playoff seeding and all of that,” Kalama head coach Mike Phelps said. “The good news is our kids are used to that schedule. All of our non-league games from last year, other than Woodland, were against teams we’re going to be playing this year in league.”
Still, the Chinooks are boasting just 36 players on the roster this season, which is a drop-off of about 10 players from recent years. That drop can be blamed primarily on a small freshman class that saw just three players turn out.
But there’s several names on the roster that will have Chinooks fans brimming with hope in this new era. And at the top of that list is quarterback Aiden Brown, who returns for his senior campaign.
“He’s coming off a really good junior year. He’s getting some college attention, not as much as he should in my opinion,” Phelps said of his 5-foot 9-inch signal caller.
But so far his heart, not to mention his arm strength and foot speed, has helped Brown overcome any height challenges he’s faced.
“He’s super fast. He’s super strong. He’s been a monster in the weight room and he’s improved on the little things,” Phelps noted. “He’s more mindful of his footwork. He’s more mindful of how much time he has in the pocket. He’s more mindful of when he needs to step up and throw it or tuck it and run.”
Erik Schulson, as senior, wide receiver will likely be one of Brown’s top targets. Johnny Martinez, another senior, is also poised to haul in passes this season after spending last year helping the ‘Nooks win the kicking game as a punter and place kicker. Fellow senior Drew Schlangen will get the bulk of the touches out of the backfield.
Elijah Fox, a senior, and junior Reece Achen will anchor the Kalama offensive line with muscle and experience.
The Chinooks and their penchant for slinging the ball around should fit right in with their new league opponents after spending years down in the run heavy Central 2B League.
“In general it’s a much more all-around game,” Phelps said. “Most teams in the Trico are going to be close to equal passing and running. Where traditionally, Onalaska is going to be 90/10 (percent) running and passing, and Toledo is going to be somewhere around 80/20.”
One notable change this season for the Chinooks will be the loss of offensive coordinator Brandon Walker from the skybox. Walker has taken over Athletic Director duties at Kalama High School and Dan Brown has assumed the play calling role.
“We’re still going to sling the ball but we’ll also run some Diesel,” Phelps promised.
As for the defense, the Chinooks are committed to showing four linemen with their hands on the ground. For there, they’ll move their athletes around to suit the offense they’re trying to stop.
Fox and Achen will once again anchor the line, with Schulson holding down one defensive end spot. Brown will play in the secondary, but it’s Schlangen who Phelps calls, “The guy on defense,” and, “a coach on the field,” for his play as a middle linebacker.
The Chinooks did not play a jamboree in the preseason but they’ve spent plenty of time thinking about what it will look like when the pads finally start popping at game speed. With its move up to the 1A ranks, Kalama will also rekindle its old rivalry with Castle Rock, although they may have to ask their uncles to tell them about the great battles of yore.
“Kids these days don’t really get into the history of stuff… but for this team what they’re familiar with is that it’s been a close game agains (Castle Rock) the last two years,” Phelps said. “It’s always been a good, tight, competitive game. Our kids know it’s going to be a dogfight with them all four quarters.”
Along with the Rockets, Kalama will have to look out for Seton Catholic (State semifinalist in ’23) and the forever feisty Wildcats of La Center.
First, the Chinooks will have to take on an even larger foe when they host Woodland for an 8-Mile War in Week 1. Kalama and the Beavers will kick the season off at 7 p.m., Friday, up on the hill.
KALAMA CHINOOKS
COACH/YEAR: Mike Phelps, 3rd year
LAST YEAR’S RECORD/FINISH: 8-4
ROSTER NUMBER: 36
KEY RETURNERS
Aiden Brown, QB/DB
Elijah Fox, C/DL
Reece Achen, OL/DL
Erik Schulson, WR/DB
Drew Schlangen, MLB/RB. The guy on defense. Coach on the field. leader. MLB/RB
Johnny Martinez, WR/K/P
OFFENSE: Spread/Diesel
DEFENSE: 4-front
GAMES TO WATCH
Sept. 6 - vs Woodland
Nov. 1 - at Castle Rock
Editor's Note: Previews for Kelso and Mark Morris were previously released. This work constitutes a preview of the type of local sports coverage Blast Zone Media aspires to provide for a growing online audience. Look for more work in the near future from familiar bylines like Jordan Nailon, Ben Zimmerman and Sam Barbee.