High School Football: The N2/BZM Power Rankings VI
Pound for Pound – Three teams still haven't lost, while five Blast Zone schools chase gridiron league titles
Nick Sisson (N2 Media) and Jordan Nailon (Blast Zone Media) / blastzonenews@gmail.com
Prep Football / Rankings
With a larger-than-normal-life amount of attention being paid to the Seattle Mariners recently, it is important to remind all of you that last Friday, (and sometimes Thursdays, too) high school football games did indeed take place beneath blazing lights and we’ve confirmed that teams from all over The Blast Zone did take part in such contests.
The week went over without any real storylines that buck the narratives we’ve already established surrounding area teams. It didn’t matter if they were looking to maintain dominance in the ranks, or just keep their heads above water for the time being — last week nearly everyone was who we thought the were.
In the former category, Toledo and Wahkiakum continue to make the Blast Zone power rankings voters look very smart after monster wins once again that left both teams still undefeated at 6-0. The games have been getting out of hand early lately, and the touchdowns are stacking up at an alarming pace. That’s why both teams have decided to try to meet self-imposed objectives while attempting to simulate the tougher assignments they know they will face in the near future.
Other teams have had a much tougher time finding the end zone as of late, and that trend continued for The Long Lumberjacks after Woodland left Longview Memorial Stadium with a 41-0 win last week. That shutout ran Long’s scoreless streak to three straight games. The last local teams to suffer that long of a drought were Winlock and Clatskanie, both in 2015
Meanwhile, the Beavers did what they needed to do in order to keep their hopes for a third straight league championship alive and well. The Jacks tried to maintain possession and worked in a new addition, senior Riley Young, who ended up leading Long in rushing, receiving, and tackles in his ver first game. It remains to be seen if Young’s presence in the huddle will change the Jacks’ fortunes down the stretch, but it certainly can’t hurt their chances of avoiding a winless season.
At the same time, their neighbors and co-tenants at Memorial Stadium from Mark Morris put Ridgefield to the test last week down in Spudville. Even though the Monarchs lost 34-20, they had the game tied in the fourth quarter and had plenty of opportunities to possibly pull off the upset. The storyline coming out of the game was all about penalties that wiped away touchdowns — and head coach Mike Peck.
After Mark Morris recovered a fumble just outside of their own end zone, coach Peck was flagged for what was described as “celebrating” along the sidelines, and then when he asked the official for an explanation, he was ejected and had to watch from behind the stadium fence from the third quarter on. Sources are unclear on whether Peck spent the rest of the game keeping tabs on the Mariners’ 15-inning win to clinch a spot in the American League Championship Series, but we do know an appeal was filed by the Mark Morris administration regarding the ejection. We wait with bated breath to see if Peck will patrol the sideline at The Stadium tonight.
The biggest winner from last week has to be the Golden Domers of Kelso High School. The Scotties went on the road in the dreaded Thursday night road game in (basically) Vancouver against a quality opponent, and on the heels of an emotional home victory the week prior. But there was no letdown in the cards for Kelso after it took control early against Prairie en route to a 20-14 win.
The Hilanders are now 5-1 on the season and playing their brand of football in the process. The running game is doing what it wants, and the defense is getting pressure on the quarterback with minimal pass rushers. At 2-0 in league play (against the consensus preseason top-two teams), and a battle ahead against undefeated Heritage on the horizon, Kelso can take another big step in the direction of a league championship with a win on the road this week at McKenzie Stadium.
Joining the likes of Kelso in the win column last week were some familiar names that have been seen multiple times in the Pound for Pound Top-5 rankings. You see, they just keep winning, so we just keep leaving them in there.
Clatskanie (6-0) keeps beating everyone on their schedule after staving off Harrisburg 20-14 at home in Week 6. It turns out the OSAA 2A rankings aren’t quite as generous as your friendly N2/BZM assessors, as the powers that be in Oregon Country have Clatskanie slotted all the way up at No. 10. Despite being undefeated, the Tigers are seated behind six different teams that have already tasted defeat.
Toutle Lake is almost all the way back in our good graces, while their opponents from last week are decidedly not. The Fighting Ducks flexed their “Flying V” skills up and down the gridiron so well that their foes from Mossyrock literally waived the white flag after falling behind 46-0. And it turns out forfeiting the remainder of one league contest wasn’t good enough for Mossy, so they decided to get out in front of the impending collision with Onalaska in Week 7 by forfeiting the Old Helmet rivalry game in advance.
And that’s not all. Naselle (5-1) had Taholah cancel midweek, so the Comets lined up Tulalip Heritage to play instead. Less than 24-hours later Tulalip had also canceled, leaving Naselle on the outside looking in for Week 7.
We thought the entire purpose of playing high school sports is to, you know, play the games! (Insert: “That’s why you play the game!” quote in strong dad voice.)
What are we doing here people? Instead of teams canceling last minute and forcing their would-be/should-be opponents to work the phones overtime just to find a replacement, how about we do what was intended all along? Simply play the games on the schedule.
Who knows why we even lend our opinion on such matters that are obviously way outside of our scope and area of expertise. But former REDACTED sports editor Meg Mochnick certainly agrees, and so does The Gridiron Grump! So we can’t be too far over the “get-back” line. Not far enough to get ejected, at least.
And what’s the big deal anyway? After all, Onalaska is coming off a loss for the second time already this season. If the Old Helmet isn’t worth fighting over this year, will the Loggers ever even bother to get the rivalry trophy out of storage in the future? To be honest, sources say Ony stopped bringing The Helmet years ago.
Alas, we digress. The combined brain trust at the N2/BZM headquarter have put together another week’s worth of bulletin board material for whoever wants to use it. Thumbtacks not included.
Keep scrolling to find out what we think about your favorite teams below.
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