Less than a week to go before high school football kicks off. So, naturally, our unusually mild and not-humid summer has departed in favor of the usual August swelter.
I'm not complaining! Well, too much, anyway. As I've told a couple of people recently, now that we're into late August (and this is the first time the thermometer has threatened 90 degrees all summer), even if it does get beastly hot and sticky, you know it can't hang around for all that long. Fall isn't very far away. Unfortunately, we do know what follows fall, but after last year maybe the gods of snow and ice and frigid blasts of wind and all that will take pity on us. Maybe?
Plus, I just checked the forecast for next Friday, and the National Weather Service is calling for a pleasant day with highs in the upper 70s. Just about perfect for outdoor activities, including high school football. So I hope you will partake in a game somewhere - preferably with me on the air on KMRY radio, but since the Xavier-Dowling game is going to be delayed until after Kernels baseball, you can catch a game live before you listen. Solon and Iowa City Regina is a big one in this area. You've also got Cedar Falls-Iowa City High and Cedar Rapids Kennedy-Iowa City West. A lot of interesting contests to open up the 2014 season.
I was at Xavier's scrimmage last night, at least for a bit. Naturally, you can tell almost nothing from the scrimmage, except that the first team looks better than the second team. There is a lot of size on the freshman team, I'll say (although not a huge number of players). The sophomores looked pretty good. I wonder what Coach Schulte and his wife are feeding his family, because Bryce (the sophomore who has an excellent chance of being the starting quarterback) is a big, tall dude for a sophomore. I saw his brother Reggie (two-year starter for Xavier, now entering his sophomore year at UNI) out there watching as well. You have to admit, that's a pretty sharp football family.
Anyway, Xavier starts the year with about 70 players on the varsity roster. That's a tremendous number for a 3A-sized school, even though it's down from over 80 players last year. Just in comparison, Cedar Rapids Jefferson, one of the three large public high schools in Cedar Rapids, is thrilled to have about 50 kids out for football total this season. I'm not sure if that counts the incoming freshmen, but I'm almost positive that does include the upper three grades.
But numbers alone don't guarantee success. It's the 22 players on the field, more or less, that determine how the game goes (by more or less I mean you're going to have some guys playing both ways, plus special teams is still an important part of the overall game. With a 70-player roster, you can afford to get guys some good playing time and contribute on special teams). And that's anybody's guess at this point in the season. The Saints return only four starters from last year's state 4A runners up - Nic Ekland on the defensive side (who was the team's leading tackler last season, so that's good) and fullback Jay Kortemeyer and linemen Louis Hasley and Tim Otting on the offense. Hasley, at least, looks to be starting on the defensive line, from what I saw last night (I imagine he'll go both ways, although there are some good-sized juniors listed on the roster that should see plenty of time on the field playing offensive line).
Anyway, you can't tell a lot from the open scrimmage. What will tell a lot is the first game, particularly when you're going up against a senior-dominated squad that already won the 4A state title last season. Dowling is a formidable opponent. How Xavier performs against the Maroons will prove a good measuring stick as to their overall quality and readiness to play this season.
The game is set for around 7 pm Friday, August 29 at Valley Stadium in West Des Moines. Again, KMRY radio will have the play-by-play that night on a delayed basis after Kernels baseball (probably around 9:30 - 9:45ish). You can also listen online at kmryradio.com, or the TuneIn app on your mobile device. I hope you can join us! It's going to be a fun ride this year.
Just wanted to clarify the time - Kernels games run between 2 1/2 hours and 3 hours, generally. Friday's baseball game is set for 6:35, so that will be ending between 9 and 9:30. Give Morgan Hawk a chance to wrap up the broadcast, and we're looking at probably about 9:10 at the earliest before the Xavier-Dowling game gets on the air. It could be as late as 9:45-ish, too. It all depends on how long that game takes.
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