Mustangs home against Cougars, Knights can wrap up title at home against Saints
By Brian Sumpter
Lake County Sports on Facebook
LAKE COUNTY >> Unless they earn a playoff home game, Bill Foltmer, for whom the field he plays on is named, makes his final appearance as head coach at Bill Foltmer Field Friday night as the Middletown Mustangs close out league play and the regular season against the Upper Lake Cougars.
This is Foltmer’s 40th and final season with the Mustangs. The only coach Middletown has known since 1985 is retiring at season’s end, stepping out as one of the state’s all-time leaders in wins (313 victories entering Friday, leaving him tied for ninth on the state’s all-time list). A win by the Mustangs should put them into the North Coast Section Division 7 playoffs, extending Foltmer’s career by at least one game.
And who knows what could happen if the Mustangs make the postseason? If you take a real hard look at the players taking the field Friday night, you may notice two that you haven’t seen in a while, namely quarterback Blake Costlow and wide receiver Jon Hawkins. Though both were lost early in the season with season-ending-type injuries – Costlow a broken foot and Hawkins a fractured wrist – both are suiting up against Upper Lake, and both are starting.
“Yes, they’ll start,” said Foltmer, who watched both players go through their paces during a Wednesday afternoon practice. “Both have been medically cleared.”
Middletown and Upper Lake find themselves in a similar situation as they enter Friday’s action – both are tied in the North Central League I standings at 3-4, both have identical 4-5 overall records, and both need a win to reach the postseason. Upper Lake has dropped three straight.
Upper Lake head coach Stan Weiper, formerly of Lower Lake and Kelseyville, has been coaching since the 1970s, so the season finale brings together two of the more remarkable coaching figures the county has ever produced. Foltmer’s 1999 squad beat Weiper’s Kelseyville team in the old North Coast Section Class A championship game, and the two have gone head-to-head many times since the early 1990s. The last Lower Lake team (2007) to beat Middletown was coached by Weiper, who led the Trojans to the NCL I North championship that season, Lower Lake’s last league title in football.
Weiper is now in his second season with the Cougars and is trying to coach them back to respectability in the 11-man ranks. Upper Lake switched to eight-man football between 2015-2022 with mixed results. With an up-and-coming youth football program now providing the high school teams a decent amount of talent, the Cougars have returned to the 11-man game. Predictably, the Cougars struggled last season and went just 1-8 although their junior varsity team earned a championship. They’ve been competitive in all of their games this season and were 4-2 at one point before dropping consecutive games to Kelseyville (7-0), Fort Bragg (4-3) and Willits (7-1), among the league’s top teams.
There’s no telling where Middletown would be entering Week 11 if the Mustangs hadn’t lost Costlow after Week 2 and the versatile Hawkins (receiver, defensive back, kicker) in Week 4. Even minus those players, they’ve held their own against the league’s best teams, dropping decisions of 24-21 to Kelseyville, 14-7 to Willits and 9-7 to St. Helena (6-1), largely because of the personal they have remaining, and largely because of a tightly knit and veteran coaching staff led by Foltmer. Both players haven’t seen action in more than a month – two months in Costlow’s case – but both are back now, so the offense Foltmer envisioned for the Mustangs at season’s start has a chance to work some magic against the Cougars, and beyond if things go Middletown’s way Friday.
Middletown also has one of the more dangerous backfields in the league between junior Trenton Griffith and freshman Tyler Galamay, and when Costlow and Hawkins, both juniors, return next season, the Mustangs’ new head coach will have plenty to work with, not to mention players moving up from a championship JV squad.
With good weather in the forecast unlike last weekend when rain fell throughout the Redwood Empire, Bill Foltmer Field should be packed with Middletown fans and especially former Foltmer players as they celebrate four decades of Foltmer memories and incredible successes, a chapter of Middletown sports history unlikely to be repeated.
In other Week 11 matchups as the regular season concludes:
St. Helena at Kelseyville (at Lakeport)
Former Kelseyville head coach Erick Larsen (2015-22), now in his second year with the Saints, faces his old team with a piece of the league title on the line.
Kelseyville clinched no worse than a share of the league title last week with a 40-14 victory over Clear Lake in Bass Bowl XIV, but the Knights need a victory against the Saints to secure the outright championship. A St. Helena win would result in a three-way tie – Kelseyville, St. Helena and Willits all finishing 7-1 – and certainly have playoff implications as well for all three teams.
The Knights are as close to full strength as they have been in several weeks. Senior running back Kyle Watkins missed two league games with an injury and played the next two at less than 100 percent, but he appeared to be all the way back last week against Clear Lake, rushing for 179 yards and a touchdown and catching two TD passes. Running back/linebacker Bryce Kenner is also back after nursing a hamstring injury for a couple of weeks. Wide receiver Reme Strong, a senior, isn’t expected to return this season because of a shoulder injury.
Kelseyville is gunning for its first undefeated league season since 2018 when Larsen coached the Knights to a 7-0 finish and 10-2 overall mark.
In the department of unfinished business for the Knights, they are looking to avenge a 17-14 loss last year at St. Helena. The Knights did beat the Saints 18-14 in 2022, also at St. Helena, in Larsen’s final season at Kelseyville.
Kelseyville, St. Helena and Willits will all learn their playoff assignments (what division they’re in), opponents, game locations and times Sunday when the section releases the postseason brackets.
Lower Lake at Fort Bragg
While Fort Bragg, sitting at 5-4 overall, is already playoff eligible, the Timberwolves will be looking to close out a winning regular season with a victory against the Trojans, losers of six straight. Lower Lake (1-6, 3-6) didn’t put up much of a fight at home the last two weeks, falling to Kelseyville 42-8 and to Middletown 48-0 last week.
These two teams have played a couple of nailbiters in recent years. Lower Lake won 21-20 at home last season and just missed in 2021, falling 19-18 at Gordon Sadler Field. The Trojans also prevailed 29-21 in 2019, again at home.
Clear Lake at Cloverdale
Cloverdale is forfeiting the varsity game to Clear Lake because it doesn’t have enough healthy players, so the Cardinals will finish the season 2-6 in league and 2-8 overall, the team’s worst record since 2018 (2-5, 2-8). Mark Cory, the Cardinals’ head coach since the 2016 season, has already announced his resignation, so the hunt for a new coach will soon begin.
While Cloverdale is forfeiting the varsity game, a junior varsity game is scheduled at 5 p.m.
Willits (bye week)
The Willits Wolverines will be doing some serious scoreboard watching Friday night as the St. Helena vs. Kelseyville game (at Don Owens Stadium in Lakeport) unfolds. Willits will either finish in sole possession of second place (with a Kelseyville win) or tied for the league title (with a St. Helena win).
