March 19, 2024

It’s time to give Colfax-Mingo football credit it deserves

The Associated Press high school football poll comes out every Monday afternoon. And it has become a weekly tradition that a few of us voters take to social media outlets to express our displeasure to how some vote.

It is not required to post your poll so no one knows who is voting for who each week, but the fact that Iowa City Regina doesn’t get all of the Class 1A first-place votes is baffling.

How does a voter, who is expected to make intelligent decisions, not give your No. 1 vote to a program that has won five straight titles and gone 75-1 since 2010?

And the Regals have won 19 straight games since losing to 3A Solon in the 2013 opener.

Last week, Hinton received a first-place vote. This week, Hinton was joined by Dike-New Hartford and West Branch as other teams who garnered one first-place vote.

No disrespect to those three other teams, but anyone who doesn’t vote Regina as their No. 1 team should have their voting rights taken away.

The same can be said about Pella, who continues to not be the unanimous No. 1 in 3A.

The rest of the classes are not as clear cut. That brings me to Colfax-Mingo, and the lack of respect the Tigerhawks are getting from voters.

The Tigerhawks are approaching history this year. They are closing in on a top-two seed in Class A District 7 and that will get them their first home playoff game since 2003.

They have wins over Lynnville-Sully, Belle-Plaine and Montezuma. All three of those teams have been ranked in one of the polls this year. L-S and Montezuma have seen time in the AP poll yet Colfax-Mingo still sits just outside the top 10.

I have the Tigerhawks sixth in Class A. Maybe that is too high. Maybe not. But Colfax-Mingo deserves much more respect than it is getting.

At this point, the only thing that will get them into the AP rankings would be a home win over current No. 2 BGM. That’s not impossible, but it’s a lot to ask of any team.

I personally know a lot of the voters who participate in the poll. Most of us do our due dilligence when voting.

I have tried to tell the voters that Colfax-Mingo is getting overlooked. I thought for sure the win over Montezuma would get them into the poll.

I was wrong.

I have talked to C-M coach Jeff Lietz several times about the rankings. He is more concerned with where his squad sits at the end of the year but truly believes his team should get rewarded for what it’s accomplished so far.

It could help the Tigerhawks. I imagine they’ll continue to play with a chip on their shoulders.

I just hope the voters eventually see what I see. A win over BGM in Colfax in two weeks would certainly do the trick.