Mustangs visit red-hot Eagles; Kelseyville hosts Fort Bragg in North matchup
By Brian Sumpter
Lake County Sports on Facebook
LAKE COUNTY >> The North Central League I South football race certainly has been worth the price of admission this season as Stuart Hall, Middletown, Cloverdale and St. Helena have provided some exciting moments, and with plenty more left to come.
The outcome of this year’s South race hinges largely on the outcome of two games taking place Friday as the St. Helena Saints (0-2, 4-4) host the Stuart Hall Knights (2-0, 7-1) and the Middletown Mustangs (2-1, 6-2) visit the Cloverdale Eagles (2-0, 7-1).
“At the beginning of the year you don’t know what to expect, which division will be the hardest, but the South has become a gauntlet right now,” Middletown head coach Kurtis Woodard said of the newly constituted NCL I, which now features South and North divisions.
While a rebuilding St. Helena team hasn’t won a South game yet, the Saints have been right there in the two they’ve played to date, losing 22-21 at Middletown (on Oct. 9) and 35-32 at Cloverdale last week, a game that see-sawed back and forth in the fourth quarter against an Eagles squad that hasn’t loss since zero week nearly two months ago.
Stuart Hall, the new kid on the block as the former eight-man football power switched to the 11-man game this season, its first in the NCL I, rallied with a late fourth-quarter touchdown drive and two-point conversion to beat Middletown 29-28 two weeks ago in Middletown. Depending on the outcome of the Middletown at Cloverdale game Friday, Stuart Hall can clinch no worse than a tie for the title with a victory at St. Helena, a team that gave Middletown all sorts of problems with a running game that chewed up huge chunks of time on the clock.
While the NCL I South race is in the spotlight Friday night, Kelseyville (1-0, 4-4) looks to win a third straight game when it hosts Fort Bragg (0-2, 1-7), a loser of seven straight, in NCL I North action. In NCL I interlock play, Upper Lake (2-6) is home against Lower Lake (1-6). Willits (2-0 North, 4-5) has a bye week before closing out its league and regular-season schedule Nov. 6 at home against Kelseyville, a game that will likely decide the North champion.
Middletown at Cloverdale
“All respect to them, they’ve turned their program around,” Woodard said of the Eagles, winners of seven straight, or exactly two more wins than they had in the 2023-25 seasons combined.
Cloverdale struggled to keep 11 healthy bodies on the field as recently as two years ago when the team forfeited two games and cut others short because of injury problems. Several sophomores who started on that 2024 team are now paying back their opponents with interest.
“That’s the thing you’ve got to like,” Woodard said. “They haven’t done it by bringing in new players, they’ve done it with guys they’ve already had and who have worked hard to get here.”
While Stuart Hall relies on its passing game and St. Helena its running game to move the ball, Cloverdale can do both, according to Woodard, and that’s makes them all the more dangerous.
“Their quarterback (Evan Robledo, a junior) has an arm and is good at finding the open receiver,” Woodard said. “He trusts his guys downfield to make a play.”
Robledo has 1,201 passing yards and 13 touchdowns, and he’s hardly a one-dimensional quarterback. He also leads the Eagles with 481 rushing yards, putting him just ahead of Carson Brown (468 yards, five TDs), Cloverdale’s tried-and-test three-year veteran at fullback. Kingston Cavallo is another Eagle to keep an eye on with 334 receiver yards (four TDs) and 160 rushing yards (four TDs). Vann Randolph, a senior receiver, leads the Eagles with 20 catches for 436 yards and five TDs.
Robledo knows how to spread the ball around and has thrown touchdowns to six different players this season.
“I’ve been using the word ‘discipline’ a lot in practice this week because we have to stay disciplined, all 11 players on both sides of the football,” Woodard said when asked what the Mustangs need to do to beat the Eagles. “We need everyone to do his job.”
Woodard said his players, to their credit, have remained remarkably focused on the task at hand this week, knowing what’s at stake in the league standings and beyond.
“It just motivates them even more,” Woodard said.
A Middletown win and a Stuart Hall loss to St. Helena on Friday clinches a co-championship for the Mustangs, who are playing their final South game. They finish up the following week with an interlock game at Fort Bragg. Middletown can’t win the South outright since Cloverdale plays at Stuart Hall on Nov. 7, and that means one of those teams will also have three wins should both lose on Friday.
If Stuart Hall and Cloverdale both win Friday, that Nov. 7 game at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco will decide the whole shooting match, and Middletown will finish third.
“We’ve watched a lot of film this week,” Woodard said. “I feel like we have a good game plan for them. My coaches have worked hard on this one.”
Fort Bragg at Kelseyville
The Knights haven’t had their best week in practice, but head coach Logan Barrick said there is absolutely no way they are looking past the Timberwolves, who haven’t won since late August.
“The Upper Lake game didn’t go well for them last week (Fort Bragg lost 55-16), but they were able to move the ball against Upper Lake, and they were driving for touchdowns a couple of times and turned the ball over. They weren’t far off from making that a closer game in the first half.”
Two pick-six interceptions by Upper Lake – a 71-yarder and a 97-yarder – broke the game open during a 30-point second quarter for the Cougars, who trailed 8-6 after one quarter.
“They were two bad passes away from being in it,” Barrick said.
Either way, Barrick said the Knights’ are not going to be looking past the Timberwolves, which is something they were guilty of last year when Fort Bragg won 8-6 in Fort Bragg.
“Our guys looked past them last year and we got a rude awakening,” Barrick said. “They are eager to get them back for that. It’s also senior night, so I think that we’ll be just fine.”
Fort Bragg runs a variety of formations on offense, so the Kelseyville defense has its work cut out.
“Regardless of what they’re showing us, we need to line up correctly,” Barrick said. “On offense, we just need to stick with what we do.”
And that’s running the ball, which the Knights have excelled at for the most part this season, even with key players out injured. A week ago in a 27-20 road win against non-league opponent Dougherty Valley, Case Pivniska and Jayden Fabisch combined for over 300 rushing yards.
Kelseyville has a chance to move over .500 for the first time this season with a win. The Knights finish up their North and regular-season schedule Nov. 6 with a road game at Willits, which has a bye this week. That game will likely decide the outright North champion.
Lower Lake at Upper Lake
While the Upper Lake Cougars played their best game of the season a week ago in a 55-16 North victory over Fort Bragg, scoring more points than they had in their first seven games combined, the Lower Lake Trojans are hoping to shift their slumbering offense out of neutral.
“We’re a boat sitting in the middle of the ocean,” Lower Lake head coach Jay Jakubowski. “I spend more of my week trying to get kids to come to practice than I do coaching them.”
Jakubowski said Upper Lake quarterback Gage Faalelea and wide receiver Antario Wyman are a lethal combination when combined with a running game led by Jacob Weldon and Brody Blancas.
“And their defense looks really strong, not overly aggressive but steady,” Jakubowski said. “They are definitely a team ascending.”
Lower Lake struggled mightily in a 47-8 South loss to Middletown a week ago in Lower Lake.
“We put too many snaps on the ground and early turnovers really hurt us,” Jakubowski said. “This late in a season we have guys banged up and we’re just trying to push them through it.”
One of those guys, running back Anthony Russell, took a helmet to his elbow against Middletown.
“It swelled up on him a little bit, it’s sore, but he’s going to play,” Jakubowski said.
Upper Lake’s 2-6 overall record notwithstanding, Jakubowski said the Cougars are a much different team now than they were back during the Lake County Scrimmage in late August and early in the season.
“They’re playing good football now and they’re a tough matchup for us,” Jakubowski said.
About the only thing slowing the Cougars right now is illness, according to head coach John Toohey.
“Illness has kept some kids away (this week). I think this is the third round of a nasty buy that’s going around,” said Toohey, who is feeling less than 100 percent himself. “I’ll get through it.”
While the Trojans are fighting themselves as much as the opposition these days, Toohey said they still have the one thing that causes opposing coaches all kinds of concern.
“They’ve got plenty of speed, and we’ve struggled with teams getting their players into space, like Stuart Hall,” Toohey said. “We need to make sure we’re breaking down and making tackles.”
Upper Lake will use both of its quarterbacks – the speedy Faalelea and passer Corbyn Woolley – as the situation dictates against Lower Lake.
“It’s a matter of seeing how the game goes, what they show us,” Toohey said. “It’s kind of a wait-and-see thing with what they (Trojans) show us.”
Upper Lake is gunning for its first two-game winning streak since midway through the 2024 season.
The Cougars wrap up their season Nov. 6 with a non-league game at Colusa.
