July 05, 2025

Raiders still focused after losing big senior class

By Shane Lucas

The CMB football team begins its season on Friday at North Polk. Members of this year’s team include (first row, from left) Aric Broderick, Lane Howes, Jake Hennick, Colin Thomson, Bailey Holgate, Lincoln Brown, Nick Littell, Spencer Gauch, Mac Pohlman, (second row) Ithica Jones, Rebeccah Henry, Nate Bishop, Kyle Cather, Chris Kuntzelman, Dylan Williams, Ashton Sadler, Issac Bennett, Ian Cook, Kaleb Wolff, (third row) Zach Huffaker, Coach Hasslebrink, Coach Cochran, Coach Christensen, Coach Stover, Coach Luther, Coach Seeman, Coach Vos, Coach Russell, Coach Aker, Joey Snyder, (fourth row) Kyle Crady, Brandon Brunner, Charles Robertson, Zach Hartgers, Ethan Cozad, Gabe Schabillion, Darrien Sadler, Brady Stover, Tim Thalacker, Dawson Dahlke, (fifth row) Andrew Lindamoen, Zach Samson, Nick Carroll, Riley Zieser, Trae Brooke, Aaron Hayes, Logan Cory, Shane White, Riley Wattonville (sixth row) Austin Moorman, Cole Pohlman, Jordan Coughenour, Joey Nissen, Clayton Weltha, Levi Bucklin, Brian Koon, Hunter Gunderson (seventh row) Trevor Thalacker, Patrick Girard, Austin McFadden, Bryce Kemp, Trevor Ehlers, Jon Engle and A.J. Flora. (Submitted Photo)

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After losing a senior class that put up eye-popping numbers, the Collins-Maxwell-Baxter football team will have to do something that any high school inevitably faces from time to time.

However, they just have to do it a little sooner than normal.

Although the Raiders are playing a Week 0 game this year and still don’t quite have the entire roster figured out, their ultimate goal remains the same — contend for a district title.

“Hopefully we can still do that,” CMB coach Rob Luther said. “We’ve got a lot of young kids that have a long way to go before we can do that, but that’s our goal.”

Luther said the team’s biggest challenges are its youth and depth, and although he’s very confident in the starting 11 on both sides of the ball, the backup positions are what will be discovered as the season progresses.

Leading the charge on offense will be junior Zach Samson, who is tasked with replacing Cody Schmitz and his more than 2,200 yards of total offense and 22 touchdowns at quarterback. Samson picked up some valuable playing time last season, albeit as a receiver, and finished third on the team with 265 yards and two touchdowns. This year, he’ll be doing the throwing instead of the catching.

“It’s kind of been the plan for some time and we’ve just been waiting for Cody Schmitz to graduate, although we wish he never would’ve graduated,” Luther said. “Zach’s had a really good offseason, a good camp and has grasped the offense really well. We’re going to let him do a lot of things with the football, and right now he’s showing he’s ready to step in.”

The Raiders will run the spread offense as usual, which will give Samson plenty of freedom. Something Luther is hoping to change from last year is the division of labor within the offense, however. The offensive attack turned somewhat one-dimensional with Josh Zeiser finishing with more than 800 receiving yards and six touchdowns, which is something Luther doesn’t want to see again.

Helping to change that trend will be sophomore Bryce Kemp and junior Austin Moorman, who received some very valuable playing time while helping to fill the void left by Andrew Broderick’s season-ending knee injury last year. Along with senior Zach Hartgers, Luther is hoping to see a multi-pronged attack.

“Every year with the spread, you try to find a few wrinkles that’ll help some guys get the ball a little more,” Luther said. “We’ve got three, four or five guys that can make plays for us this year, so we want to make sure we’re doing things to keep everyone involved. Last year we got kind of one dimensional with Cody and Josh, but they put up big numbers.”

Defensively, the Raiders return a number of multi-year starters including seniors Darrien Sadler and Tim Thalacker, who also play on the offensive line. Also returning are experienced players in Hartgers and senior Riley Wattonville, as well as sophomore Patrick Girard, who is one of the biggest players on the roster and saw some time on the field last season.

It’s players like Girard and Kemp that Luther will really look to for filling gaps and adding depth to the already young team.

“Bryce Kemp and Patrick Girard both played for us as freshmen last year and were at least out there knowing the speed of the game and Friday nights,” Luther said. “Bryce needs to come in and be a force catching the football and Girard’s just a mountain out there, so they’re just going to have to play.”

Although the Raiders will face a largely new district this season, district play is still a few weeks out of their minds due to a tough non-district schedule they will face starting on Friday with a road trip to North Polk. They then move on to Gilbert and Roland-Story, but Luther said the beginning of the season admittedly won’t be all about wins.

“Not that you don’t want to go out there and win football games, because you do, but you kind of want to go out and find yourself a little bit,” Luther said. “We just want to find out what kids can play under the lights and be physical, where our speed is and hopefully some players that look better in games than they do in practice.”