Watch out Polson, here comes Libby
By CARL HENNELL
Top Northwestern A teams post impressive opening-season victories
The Daily Inter Lake
Whoa, did you see what the Libby High School football team did last weekend.
The Loggers beat Frenchtown 6-0.
Frenchtown should have been Class A state champions last year had Dillon quarterback Zach McRae not brought the Beavers back from a 20-7 deficit in the final 5 minutes of the chipper. Sure the Broncs lost quarterback Brian Lebsock and tight end Brian Pfahler to graduation, but that is all they lost. They returned both lines and an all-state linebacker in Nick Weller, plus running back-turned-quarterback Nate Lebsock.
Obviously the Frenchtown defense remains stout, but how the heck did Libby coach Neil Fuller's squad pitch a shutout against that potent wishbone attack?
His answer: Kyle Baker and Jake Graham. He said it starts with those prized defensive ends in his 5-3 alignment.
"They are outstanding athletes and tough kids," Fuller said. "In that position (DE) in our alignment, they can play a linebacker or line up on the tight end and man up on him. They pose big problems for offenses. To run a defense like we do, you want defensive ends like them that can contain like they do."
That 5-3 may have also been a key. The alignment employs a nose guard with two defensive tackles and two defensive ends with a middle linebacker and two outside linebackers. And when you use a nose guard, he's got to be good.
Fuller said nose guard Josh Chumley did an outstanding job in his first game at that position. The 5-foot-8, 200-pound junior played linebacker last year and coaches wanted to take a look at him at the nose.
"I think we found a position for him," Fuller said.
With 260-pound Lyle Jordan at one defensive tackle, Matt Schad, Jordan Gragert and Brandon Chapman rotated at the other.
Fuller is ecstatic with defensive coordinator Craig Rowan, whose unit held the Broncs to 135 rushing yards and five first downs. And that was with three new linebackers.
The team moved Christian Lehnerd from nose guard to middle linebacker and Fuller said "he did awesome in his first game. There's still a lot of room for improvement, but he did awesome."
Steve Bertelson moved from free safety to outside linebacker because the coaches wanted him closer to the ball because he is the team's biggest hitter. Richard
Brumbaugh is starting for the first time at the other outside linebacker.
"It will take some adjusting for those linebackers but it is really a testament to (LB coaches) Jim May and Josh Bean, especially considering the inexperienced players," Fuller said.
All the excitement, and Frenchtown didn't commit any turnovers.
"Our kids did a great job of doing exactly what they were coached to do," Fuller said. "(Frenchtown's) play-action passing didn't hurt us."
The only thing that hurt the Loggers was when Frenchtown uncharacteristically lined up in a shotgun with Lebsock - an all-state running back taking over the quarterbacking duties from graduated brother, Brian - at the controls.
"They would spread the field out on us and have (Nate) in the shotgun and that posed some problems for us," Fuller said. "But when they stayed in the double-tight bone set, we were able to contain them."
On offense, Fuller is in the midst of spreading the field with quarterbacks Baker and sophomore Joel Fuller using sprintouts to their advantage to go with the tried-and-true option running game.
"We're trying to open it up, but we were a little conservative - maybe too conservative in that game," Fuller said. "We've got a lot of work to do.
"Our key offensive player was Graham at fullback. We are setting up plays to get him the ball on the perimeter, but he got all his yards in that game up the gut. And that was behind an inexperienced line. He was an animal, running the linebacker over. And they (the Broncs) are good. We put the game on his shoulders and rode him to victory."
Graham had 87 yards on 19 carries and his biggest gain was a 12 yarder.
Fuller said he was really pleased with the play of his offensive line. Line coach Tim O'Dell didn't have any returning starters and rotated eight different linemen throughout the game - that included four different centers who didn't have any bad exchanges.
"We are really excited to see our kids competing like this," Fuller said. "We watched film and there is lots of room for improvement."
The Loggers were picked to finish the Northwestern A regular season in second place neck-and-neck behind Polson.
Polson trampled Hamilton, 37-6, with a 276-yard running attack. Bryce Picard had 89 yards on just nine carries. Ted Morigeau had 87 yards and three touchdowns on just six carries. Pat Dellwo added 41 yards on 13 carries and Joe Andrews had 29 yards on six carries.
Whitefish made a quasi statement for its third-place preseason ranking with a one-possession victory over Havre, 9-7.
Senior running back Luke Fennelly rushed for 203 yards but the Bulldogs scored just one touchdown - and that was off a pass play 26 seconds before halftime.
"We were pretty rusty," Whitefish coach Patrick Dryden said. "Havre is very strong and physical but we had some miscues on offense. It was a week earlier than we were used to having our season opener and we went into the game blind with just the film of what Havre did last year."
The touchdown came off a second-down, play-action pass that sucked Havre's defenders towards Fennelly and his brother, Zach, found tight end Scott Yogodzinski for the TD and a 9-0 lead.
The Bulldogs scored a safety near the end of the first quarter when senior linebacker Seth Thomas flushed Havre quarterback Tanner Donovan out of the pocket towards junior defensive end Brian Flickinger and junior outside linebacker Matt Starr, who combined to sack Donovan in the end zone.
"He (Donovan) was looking for a slant route but pump faked it and wanted to hit his wide receiver deep, but we had (Thomas) break through to flush him out of the pocket," Dryden said.
The WHS defense held Havre to just 150 yards of total offense and nearly pitched a shutout, but the Blue Ponies scored with about 5 minutes left in the game.
"We held a big advantage in team speed," Dryden said. "They ran a lot of misdirection stuff with two big running backs. One was 215 pounds and the other was 200 and they ran the ball more than we thought they would, but our team speed gave us the advantage.
"Our kids up front played well, but they (the Blue Ponies) shot themselves in the foot a few times just like we did."
But the name of the game was definitely Luke Fennelly and his 200 rushing yards.
"He had a great game," Dryden said. "We ran him using a little bit of everything. He has such good vision and cuts really well."
All told, WHS rushed for 240 yards and Dryden credited his offensive line of Chris Kirkemo, Kevin McDowell, Lucas Gregory, Clay Christiansen and Chris McCloy with the victory.
"No doubt, we ran the ball well," he said. "We just have to get the passing game going."
Columbia Falls gave Northwestern A the other opening-week victory. The Wildcats shut out Corvallis, 16-0, without any scores on offense.
Northwestern A
Standings
Columbia Falls 1-0
Polson 1-0
Libby 1-0
Whitefish 1-0
Bigfork 0-1
Eureka 0-1
Ronan 0-1
Results
Libby 6, Frenchtown 0
Whitefish 9, Havre 7
C-Falls 16, Corvallis 0
Polson 37, Hamilton 6
Dillon 38, Bigfork 6
Browning 7, Ronan 6
Stevensville 42, Eureka 7
Schedule
High River at Eureka
Libby at Hamilton
Whitefish at Corvallis
Polson at Stevensville
Browning at C-Falls