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- Val T.
- 5 days ago
- 7 min read
Valley travels to improved Plymouth; Caston hosts No. 6 Carroll; Pioneer seeks 3rd straight win over Lewis Cass; Culver to try and extend Attica skid; Winamac heads to W. Central
BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
Rochester at Southwood, 7 p.m.
The Rochester football team starts the season with a stable of running backs that might be as deep as coach Ron Shaffer has brought to Rochester in his five years as coach.
Senior wingback Brant Beck ran for 1,460 yards and 20 touchdowns last year. Junior fullback Kale Shotts ran for 764 yards and 11 touchdowns. Junior wingback Trenton Meadows ran for 436 yards and six touchdowns. Senior wingback Jabez Yarber, a move-in from Caston, has 1,569 career rushing yards in three years of varsity experience.
“I would say we’re matching probably when you had Beck, you had (Colton) Ferverda, you had (Payton) Luhnow,” Shaffer said. “That group, you had several that could play halfback. I guess we need to get a little bit further into the season to know if it’s going to be one of the deeper groups we’ve had over my stint here, but right now, it looks like it’s going to be a pretty deep group.”
Shaffer said Matt Crossland, who is already the starter at right tackle on offense, gained a lot of playing time at defensive tackle after a good scrimmage. Shaffer also complimented junior Grant Holloway.
“We thought Grant Holloway looked decent and was not awestruck by the moment because he hasn’t played at that level and speed of the game, and we thought he played fast for his first varsity action,” Shaffer said.
As for their opponent, the epicenter of Three Rivers Conference football intrigue since the end of last season has been Thomas Tyree as he left one TRC football coaching job (Southwood) following an 0-10 season to take over another TRC football program coming off an 0-10 season (Whitko).
While Whitko’s program has been mired in a rut, Southwood has had two distinctly successful runs in the last 30 years. The first run came from 1995-2002 when Southwood went 68-21. The Terry Siddall-coached Knights capped that run with a 13-1 record and a state title in 2002.
The second run came from 2017-20, when the Dave Snyder-coached Knights went 44-5 and won sectional titles in 2017 and 2020. That run included both a highlight-film passing connection between quarterback Carson Blair and wide receiver Peyton Trexler and an impenetrable defense towards the end of the run.
However, since the start of 2021, Southwood is 17-25.
Josh Marley, a former Tri-Central assistant coach, has stepped in to fill the void. He is Southwood’s third coach in three years, and this is his first game as a high school head coach.
Maddox Marshall ran for a team-high 535 yards and five touchdowns last year as a running back for Tyree. Marley has moved Marshall to quarterback this year and changed the offense to a spread.
“I would probably call him a run-first guy,” Shaffer said of Marshall. “He’s only attempted two passes in his high school career yet. So we saw him on film against Churubusco and Southern Wells (in a scrimmage) , and he throws a good football. He definitely fits the part of what they want to do, but he’s transitioning from a tailback position last year to the quarterback position. So we’ll see how that goes. I’d say the jury’s still out on him. We’ll see how he performs on Friday, but he definitely has a good command of what they’re trying to do right now.”
Tippecanoe Valley at Plymouth, 7 p.m.
Valley purposely kept the offensive play calling basic in last week’s scrimmage against Fairfield, according to coach Stephen Moriarty.
“We didn’t run very many plays in general,” Moriarty said. “We kept it pretty vanilla, just working on our base plays that we had. I think we had four run plays and four pass plays that we ran.”
Asked about the offensive line, Moriarty said the staff made sure to use a lot of players. Carlos Gonzalez and Kolten Sisk are returnees at the tackle spots, and Parker Adamson is a returnee at center. Cale DeWees has some experience at guard, and Jacob Bradley and Blake Cooksey, a transfer from Warsaw, are also competing for playing time.
Gabe Overbey, who played guard last year, is moving to H-back this year, a hybrid role that could see him moving all over the formation. Ty Kiser will also get playing time at H-back.
“We rotated around a lot and got to see a lot of different people come in there,” Moriarty said. “So we’re kind of still working that out just to find out how the puzzle pieces fit together. I think we’re close. I think there’s a lot of blocking assignments. You can always work on those. But I think making sure we communicate is one of the most important parts, and I thought on Friday night, no matter who was in there, I thought we communicated well.”
As for communication defensively, Valley has made a change where weak side linebacker Grady Moriarty will make the call in the huddle. Typically, the middle linebacker in a defense has done that. Diego Gonsalez, this year’s middle linebacker, has his own responsibility.
“We set it up this year where Grady calls the defense, and Diego makes sure he runs down and distance,” coach Moriarty said. “We’ve tried to practice the two-communications-in-one-listen practice with all defensive personnel, and I think Diego does a great job of that. He is a senior leader, and he’s always making sure that everybody understands what down and distance and where the tight end is.”
Valley has replaced one Northern Lakes Conference opponent for another in its season opener, dropping Wawasee and adding Plymouth. Valley outscored Wawasee 135-19 in starting the season 1-0 the last four years.
Now they head to the Rockpile to face a Class 4A Plymouth team that has resurrected itself after back-to-back winless seasons in 2021 and 2022. They went 2-8 in 2023 and 6-5 last year. That included an overtime win at Warsaw, who went on to make the Class 5A state title game, and a home win over NorthWood. The win over Warsaw was their first since 2019, and the win over NorthWood was their first since the 2015 sectional.
Ben Shively takes over at quarterback for Plymouth after the graduation of Exzander Ramirez. Coach Moriarty praised his arm strength, saying he has a “cannon.”
He will be handing off to backfield stalwart Finn Holm, who ran for 858 yards and 14 touchdowns last year.
Coach Moriarty described Holm as a “between-the-tackles” runner last year, but he added that they will also try and get Holm the ball in space.
“In the scrimmage, they passed more than they ran,” coach Moriarty said. “But last year, their tendency was that they would run more. I would say that they’re going to be a pretty well balanced attack this year overall.”
Defensively, Plymouth runs a 3-4 alignment.
“They have a lot of defensive tackles that can move well, so they’ll slant a lot against us,” coach Moriarty said. “And their linebackers, both of them are returning from last year, and they can really get up and down the field. I think (Ethan) Hall and (Brady) Coffin, both of them fly around the ball. This isn’t their first year playing linebacker, and they’ve only gotten better this year.”
Moriarty was asked about the Vikings’ confidence level. The 2022 and 2023 teams might be compared to some of the better teams in school history. Last year’s team slipped from nine wins in 2023 to seven.
“Overall, we have a sense of confidence that we’re going to be better than we were last year,” coach Moriarty said. “The schedule’s tougher, but we want to make sure that we improve every game so that we can try to peak out during the right time at the end of the season. But we know that the schedule’s tough, and with our confidence, we’re just going to take it one play at a time, and Plymouth is a huge step for us right off the bat.”
Coach Moriarty said both Jamison Phillips and Hunter Paxton are both healthy and will play. Both missed the scrimmage with back injuries.
Carroll (Flora) at Caston, 7 p.m.
Logan Mollenkopf had three receptions for 68 yards in a 55-6 loss to Carroll last year.
Carroll has won the last two meetings against Caston by a combined score of 104-12.
Caston has not beaten Carroll since September 2012. That was also the season Caston had its last winning record.
Lewis Cass at Pioneer, 7 p.m.
This marks the 18th time in the last 19 seasons that Pioneer has opened with Lewis Cass. Pioneer opened against Indianapolis Scecina in 2021 for COVID reasons.
Pioneer has won the last two years over Lewis Cass. The teams have split their last six meetings.
Lewis Cass’ defense went from 21 points per game allowed two years ago to 36 points per game allowed last year. Now they will try to stop the Pioneer duo of Lucas Rans and Noah VanMeter.
Culver at Attica, 7 p.m.
Attica’s 38-game losing streak is the state’s longest current skid. They have not won a game since October 2020. Culver beat Attica 42-0 at home last year, giving themselves their first 1-0 start since 2017. Meanwhile, Attica has not started 1-0 since 2019.
Jonas McCuen completed 14 of his 16 pass attempts for 280 yards and two touchdowns and no interceptions in Culver’s 44-0 over Attica at home last year.
Theron Carrington had four tackles for loss in last year’s Attica game. Culver had six tackles for loss as a team.
Winamac at West Central, 7 p.m.
Winamac is 15-1 in their last 16 meetings against West Central, including a 24-16 win at Roudebush Field last year.
Winamac linebacker Tearson Wolford had three tackles for loss against West Central last year. Louis Rugg III and Hayden Taylor each had an interception.
Winamac is 10-10 in their season opener over the last 20 years.
