Lynnville-Sully kicks off 2017 season at SICL rival Colfax-Mingo

While the Colfax-Mingo football team was opening its season against Class 2A Saydel last Friday, Lynnville-Sully was taking part in an intrasquad scrimmage on its home field.

Hawk head coach Mike Parkinson admitted that his team going head-to-head against each other is not as beneficial as playing an opponent in a real game, but Parkinson still believes the Hawks’ season opener against the Tigerhawks will come down to execution.

“If they come out of that game healthy, it’s definitely good for them,” Parkinson said. “At the other end, you can’t emulate game speed in a scrimmage like we did. We pretty much treated our scrimmage like a game, but it’s just not the same thing. It will come down to execution like it always does.”

The Tigerhawks (0-1) host their South Iowa Cedar League rival in a non-district game at 7 p.m. Friday in Colfax. Colfax-Mingo dominated the Hawks, 40-15, two seasons ago, but Lynnville-Sully won 56-0 in 2016.

It will be a different look offensively from Colfax-Mingo, which rushed for 223 yards against the Eagles in a season-opening loss last week. Junior Damir Gumerov totaled 149 yards and two scores on his 23 carries. Running the ball in the Tigerhawks’ spread offense is crucial to their success.

“Lynnville-Sully was able to just blitz us and come at us last year because we couldn’t run the ball,” Lietz said. “I don’t think that happens to us a lot this season. Hopefully we’ll have success both on the ground and through the air.”

Parkinson saw a different team in Colfax-Mingo (0-1) on film than his team faced in last year’s season opener.

“They ran the ball quite a bit more in that first game,” Parkinson said. “This year, more than last year, they’ll make us defend the whole field. We’ll have to go sideline to sideline.”

Parkinson welcomes back a slew of returning starters from a squad which finished 8-2 a season ago. They won their first eight games before losing to Montezuma in the district and regular season finale. The Hawks’ season ended with a 13-6 road loss to eventual Class A champion Gladbrook-Reinbeck in the opening round of the playoffs.

Lynnville-Sully brings back one of its two quarterbacks who started multiple games last year, its three top rushers and two of its top three receivers.

The Hawks will have a new-look offensive line featuring juniors Rylan James and Grant Wehrle and seniors Jesse Van Wyk, Kemper Lukehart and Aaron Van Der Krol.

“We just hope to do what we do on that side of the ball,” Parkinson said. “We have spent a lot of time this preseason refining things, and we’ll try to focus on what we did well last year.”

The Tigerhawks did a admirable job slowing down Saydel’s running attack, but quarterback TJ Stephenson made some plays through the air, including a 67 yard pass play that set up a short touchdown.

Lynnville-Sully’s offense will be a similar challenge because they have several weapons to keep you guessing.

“We will try to get them out of their best five plays, but they have some weapons,” Lietz said. “They had a three-headed monster in the running game last year. It will be tough to slow them down.”

The Hawks’ defense graduated their top two tacklers and another player who led the team in sacks is not out this season. That forced Parkinson to move some kids around, but he still feels good about his defense.

“It’s coming together,” Parkinson said. “We have a lot of guys back, and I felt like we had a lot of depth last year.”

PCM at Pella Christian, 7 p.m.

The Mustangs and Eagles are both expected to be highly ranked in their respective classes when the Associated Press prep football poll comes out on Aug. 28.

Before that, the two Highway 14 rivals whose schools are separated by a little more than 12 miles will kick off the 2017 season against each other.

PCM brings back a load of skill-position talent from last year’s 9-2 squad, while Pella Christian hits the reset button a bit after losing several top-end talent from a team that went 10-1 and lost to Iowa City Regina, 45-43, in the 1A quarterfinals.

The Mustangs won their first district title and first playoff game in five seasons in 2016. They won eight straight games after falling to the Eagles, 42-20, in the season opener.

PCM brings back maybe the best running back tandem in 2A in senior Noah Anderson and junior Wes Cummings. The duo combined for more than 1,700 rushing yards and 24 touchdowns a year ago.

Cummings also had 423 receiving yards, earning third team all-state honors.

The rest of the all-state players from last season have graduated. Junior Reed Worth takes over at quarterback. The team will be led in large part by a strong junior class.

Pella Christian was hit hard by graudation. The Eagles graduated all-staters at quarterback and receiver along wthe their four top rushers, four of their top five receivers and six of their seven leading tacklers,

Baxter at West Central, 7 p.m.

The Bolts begin their 8-player era with a road game against a West Central team which went 0-9 in 2016.

Baxter will travel 129 miles one way to Maynard to face a Blue Devils squad who graduated their starting quarterback, three of their four top receivers and three of their four top tacklers.

The top returner for West Central is Collin Kime. Kime led the Blue Devils with 922 rushing yards and five touchdowns. He had a team-high 25 catches for 351 yards and two scores as a receiver.

Kime is the top returning tackler, too. He had 45 tackles and a team-high four sacks in 2016.

Baxter’s best player is junior linemen Will Clapper, who earned second team all-state honors as a 2A offensive linemen last year.

Other players expected to make a big impact for the Bolts in their first 8-player season is senior quarterback/linebacker Braydon Aker as well as seniors Travis Lindemoen, Marcus Mitchell and Devin Carson and sophomore Cole Damman.

The Bolts have a full nine-game schedule but will operate as an independent in 2017 and cannot play in the postseason.

Contact Troy Hyde at
641-792-3121 ext. 6536 or thyde@newtondailynews.com