Lower Lake visits Upper Lake, Clear Lake heads to Cloverdale
By Brian Sumpter
Lake County Sports on Facebook
LAKE COUNTY >> Even when you score 52 points in a game, there’s room for improvement, and the Middletown Mustangs, 52-6 winners at home last week against Kelseyville, are looking to polish elements of their offense Friday night when they visit Fort Bragg to play the Timberwolves in North Central League I varsity football action.
Middletown (4-1 league, 5-2 overall) couldn’t have been much more efficient a week ago against Kelseyville, scoring on its first seven possessions, but there are still some things the Mustangs can do better, according to head coach Kurtis Woodard.
“We had a pretty big film session Sunday and there are some mistakes, more mental than physical, we noticed,” Woodard said. “We got away with them, but they are things that you can’t get away with when you play teams like St. Helena.”
St. Helena (5-0, 7-0) has the league bye this week, so the Mustangs are looking to stay hot on the Saints’ heels a the NCL I race prepares to enter the homestretch. A loss to the Timberwolves (3-2, 3-4) would pretty much dash Middletown’s title chances.
Involving other players to a greater degree in the offense is one of Middletown’s goals.
“I would love to get the ball more to (John) Finney and (Hayden) Xavier,” Woodard said. “They’ve worked hard and they’ve earned it.”
Middletown certainly earned its practice stripes Monday as Woodard put the Mustangs through their paces in preparation for Fort Bragg and the remainder of their league schedule.
“I wasn’t very popular,” Woodard said. “I had them run 35 200-yard dashes. We’re not taking anyone lightly.”
Perhaps the extra bit of conditioning will help shore up a Middletown defense that has been susceptible to the run this season.
“Our goal is to get more three-and-outs and get the ball back into the hands of our offense as much as we can,” Woodard said.
Middletown remains in solid shape on the injury front heading into Fort Bragg, a team the Mustangs dropped a 37-26 decision to a year ago in Fort Bragg.
The Timberwolves had a three-game league winning streak snapped a week ago in St. Helena with a 41-7 loss to the league-leading Saints. While scoring points hasn’t come easy for Fort Bragg so far this season, the Timberwolf defense has played well at home in league play, a combined 14 points in wins over Kelseyville and Lower Lake.
“They’ve got some good players,” Woodard said of Fort Bragg senior quarterback Dane Salo, senior running back Beau Hebden, and senior wide receiver Ross Knapp.
In other NCL I action Friday, Clear Lake (3-1, 3-3) calls on Cloverdale (1-3, 2-4), Lower Lake (0-4, 2-4) visits Upper Lake (0-5, 0-7), and Kelseyville (1-3, 1-4) hosts Willits (3-1, 5-1).
Clear Lake at Cloverdale
The Cardinals will be looking to snap a two-game losing streak after back-to-back road losses to Mt. Shasta (non-league) and Willits.
Little went right for the Cardinals last week against Willits, according to head coach Augie Perez.
“We didn’t do the right things offensively or defensively,” Perez said. “And a lot of stuff happened between us and the refs, but at the end of the day that didn’t matter. We didn’t do what we needed to do to beat a team like Willits.”
Perez said he didn’t realize just how badly the Cardinals fared against the Wolverines until reviewing the game film with his players. And it was an eye-opening film session, according to Perez.
“The film never lies,” Perez said. “We’re not completing our assignments. I think it was a good session for the kids to see what they were doing.”
Against a Cloverdale team coming off its first league win, a 9-6 home victory a week ago against Upper Lake, Perez said the Cardinals simply need to get back to playing the kind of mistake-free football that carried them to three straight league wins before the two-game losing streak set in.
“We need to do what we’re capable of doing, that’s all,” Perez said.
Clear Lake emerged from the Willits game without any new injuries and is expected to suit up approximately 16 for Cloverdale. There will be a junior varsity game this week after the Cardinals forfeited last week’s JV game to Willits because they didn’t have enough players.
“We have 12 players this week,” Perez said of the JV squad.
Lower Lake at Upper Lake
Lower Lake is coming off a bye week well rested and looking forward to nailing down its first league win against an Upper Lake team also looking for its first win, league or otherwise.
Though a 21-14 loss to Willits two weeks ago in Lower Lake cost the Trojans dearly as they lost Brody Shields (collar bone) and Jordan Rohrbacker (concussion) to season-ending injuries, the team is in otherwise good shape entering Friday’s action.
“We get our quarterback back this week,” Lower Lake head coach Jay Jakubowski said of senior Ashton Hartmann, who missed the Willits game while serving a one-game suspension.
“It was good to get the kids some conditioning this past (bye) week,” Jakubowski said. “We didn’t do a lot of live hitting. We needed to get people healthy and ready to go, heal those bumps and bruises.”
While it will be tough finishing out the season with Shields and Rohrbacker, two of Hartmann’s top targets, the Trojans have managed to be competitive in all of their league games this season despite battling the injury/suspension bug.
“We’ve played teams tough and just haven’t been able to get over the hump,” Jakubowski said.
Lower Lake’s defense has played well all season. With Hartmann back behind center, Jakubowski said he likes his team’s chances of finally getting that elusive first league win.
Upper Lake head coach Derek Milhaupt said he has concentrated a lot of effort into getting an offensive line starting three sophomores up to speed as fast as possible.
“Just getting them to understand the flow of the game takes time,” Milhaupt said. “We need to do a better job getting off the ball. We weren’t firing off the ball against Cloverdale.”
Milhaupt has been juggling his offensive line for a variety of reasons since early September.
“It’s hard to gel when you do that,” Milhaupt said.
The Cougars have managed to put points on the board the last three weeks – exactly six in each of those games – after being shut out in their first four games this year. They’ll probably need a few more against Lower Lake, especially with its starting quarterback returning to the lineup.
“That’s a good Lower Lake team,” Milhaupt said. “They hung in there with Willits. They do a little of everything … they like to spread you out.”
Added Milhaupt of facing the Trojans, “It’s a matter of us getting in the right spots and making them make plays … not giving up any big plays.”
Prior to the start of the varsity game Upper Lake will introduce the first inductee into its new Hall of Fame, longtime football and girls basketball coach Craig Kinser, a veteran of many Upper Lake-Lower Lake battles in the 1970s, 80s and 90s. A more formal induction ceremony takes place Saturday night at a special function.
Willits at Kelseyville
The Knights won’t be repeating as league champions this season, but head coach Leo Flores and his Kelseyville players have the opportunity to play the spoiler’s role the rest of the way, beginning Friday night against Willits. A second league loss would almost certainly knock the Wolverines out of title contention. With a win, Willits would remain one game behind league leader St. Helena, and the Wolverines still have to face the Saints
Kelseyville did its best to play keep away from Middletown’s offense a week ago by controlling the ball with its running game on a pair of time-consuming marches, one of which produced its only points against the Mustangs, but the Knights simply made too many mistakes to stay close to Middletown, including two interceptions, a lost fumble and a high punt snap, which combined led to three quick Mustangs touchdowns.
Kelseyville’s defense also couldn’t get the Middletown offense off the field and will have to do a much better job against the Wolverines, who have plenty of weapons themselves. A year ago this game determined the NCL I championship as Kelseyville held off Willits for a 20-17 victory at Kelseyville. The Knights have the opportunity to end the Wolverines’ title hopes for a second straight season.
