Young Warriors get big win against Darby

ARLEE — Arlee football coach Todd Yocum said he felt his team needed to make “significant improvements” in spite of his team winning its last game 48-16 Friday at Arlee High School.

“We still need to make improvements,” Yocum said. “It would be nice to be on a collision course with Charlo but we still have to play Clarkfork, Seeley, and Twin Bridges. Twin Bridges has everyone back and is the team that everyone thought they were going to be with most of their kids back.”

Yocum said he felt his Warriors had a better week of practice than before last week’s 40-6 loss at the hands of Victor.

“(This week) was a better week of practice, absolutely,” Yocum said. “In our system, there is no blow off time for these kids. With the way our system is the kids just can’t miss a day of practice.”

Yocum credits RB Will Mesteth and Rylan Crawford for providing a 1-2 running back combination.

“They did a really nice job,” Yocum said. “Mesteth catches more footballs out of the backfield and Rilen is a pounding back at only 5 feet, seven inches, 160 pounds.”

Yocum also named Greg Whitesell and George Shick as major contributors to the Warriors’ offense.

“They did a good job receiving and we passed the ball way more,” Yocum said. “Our line did a good job pass blocking and our team made massive improvements (from last week).”

This week, the Warriors will play at Clark Fork Co-op (Superior-Alberton).

“There is a lot of excitement and a lot of kids playing,” Yocum said. “This will be Alberton’s homecoming and there is always a lot of excitement when the two schools come together. They have a lot of good kids as the year goes on.”

On defense, Yocum said he knows Clark Fork’s coach really well and there will be “no surprises.”

“I know they are going to come out and run a Cover-2, with a lot of three-man and four-man fronts, and that is the type of look we will see from them defensively,” Yocum said.

Yocum said his Warriors have a long way to go to make a showdown for the conference championship in the regular season finale at Charlo to come to fruition.

“We have a young, inexperienced group and we are still getting them cohesive,” Yocum said. “We have to come with the right perspective and the right approach every week. We are a team that is capable of winning out or losing out, and it could swing one way or the other. Because we have such a young team, we are still finding out what we are capable of and what we aren’t capable of.”

Ronan 43, Thompson Falls 20

Headed into the midway point of the season Chiefs’ Coach Matt Detwiler’s team has finished with a .500 record.

According to Detwiler, the Chiefs are firing on all cylinders.

“Things are definitely starting to click and our team is starting to see the benefits of all the hard work they have put in (at the beginning of the season),” Detwiler said. “We are just finding people in the right spots. We haven’t necessarily changed out people on the field. We have moved people around in different spots that they have never played before and I think that is one of the keys to our success right now.”

Detwiler credits most of his play to the Chiefs’ offensive line.

“It’s really a combination of everything that we are doing but I give the biggest credit to our offensive line,” Detwiler said. “Our wide receivers are finding ways to get open and we are blocking for each other. We are doing a really good job.”

As the Chiefs prepare for their conference-opener against Anaconda at Ronan, they hope to carry the momentum they established in the early portion of the season into conference play.

“All the way from high school to the NFL, you want to feel good about your preseason headed into the conference,” Detwiler said. “However, Anaconda is coming into this game with a lot of momentum. It’s a double-edge sword because Anaconda is coming off a three overtime victory and they are going to be coming in feeling pretty good. (At this point) all of these games matter a lot.”

According to Detwiler, the conference opener will be “tough.”

“They are a tough group of kids, their receivers are tall, and the running backs from watching the film don’t go down easy,” Detwiler said. “Our team has been pretty good at tackling and we know we are going to need multiple guys to bring him down.”

Detwiler said his team will have to step up in order to give his QB Kasey Mock time to throw.

“The offensive line is going to have to be pretty quick and step up their game to give Kasey time to get the ball out,” Detwiler said.

As the Chiefs prepare to head into homecoming, Detwiler said he felt winning a third consecutive game could really swing the Chiefs’ momentum going into the rest of the season.

“Things will have to snowball for us this week and we will have to deal with the whole week building up for this game,” Detwiler said. “I hope we come out and get a three-game winning streak going.”

Bigfork 41, Mission 0

The Mission High School football team continues to struggle to generate offense in their 41-0 loss to Bigfork Friday at Mission High School.

“You know we did some positive things (this past week),” Bulldogs’ Coach Jake Bosley said. “We ran for 150 yards that was a positive and our offensive line played well. Defensively, we had a hard time containing some of their speed guys and they were just able to break some big plays.”

Bosley also expressed optimism about the Bulldogs’ ability to pass despite not producing an offensive touchdown.

“Our passing game came around, and hopefully in the next couple of weeks we will be peaking at the end of the year,” Bosley said. “Bigfork has a real fast running back that will probably be an All-Stater and he’s having a phenomenal year.”

The Bulldogs will play Deer Lodge in their conference opener this week at Deer Lodge.

“Deer Lodge is a similar team to Bigfork,” Bosley said. “They have a really fast, shifty running back and they have a well-coached team. Hopefully we can keep the running back in check and punch a few scores in the end zone and see how it turns out.”

The Bulldogs’ Benton Adams contributed with 12 tackles and Gus Bosley had 101 yards on 22 carries.

“We had some freshman that did a great job,” Bosley said. “Some of them have never played before and they did a great job. We are a young team and we are building on our successes every week. Hopefully, by the end of the year we put a whole game together.”