The Season Approaches ...

Once the calendar page turns to July, football fans' attention starts to turn toward ... well, football. NFL training camps aren't far away, college football teams will start their preseason workouts in a few weeks, and high school practices get going in less than a month. So, with the Xavier Saints getting ready to defend their Class 3A state title this fall, let's get noodling about the upcoming season.

I'll be taking a little look at each of Xavier's opponents this fall, with this post focusing on the Saints' first foe, the Iowa City Regina Regals. Remember, with the changes to playoff qualifying that were made by the state, there's a lot of importance placed on how well your opponents do with the rest of their schedules - the better record your opponents have, the better your RPI will look, and if you don't nab an automatic playoff spot by winning your district, RPI is very important. Xavier has done pretty well with scheduling their non-district games, with four programs that have very solid histories in the area of winning percentage (Regina, Decorah, Davenport Assumption, and West Delaware).

IOWA CITY REGINA REGALS

Friday, August 24

at Regina High School, Iowa City

Broadcast on KMRY AM/FM (delayed after Kernels baseball)

Regina has one of the outstanding high school football programs in all of Iowa. They've made it to eight consecutive state championship games - eight! They won the first six (two in 2A, four in 1A) before losing the title game the past two years. In the past ten seasons, going back to 2008, the Regals have lost as many as two regular season games exactly once. That happened last year, when Regina lost both non-district games (to 3A Xavier and to 2A Mount Vernon) before winning 10 straight games in Class 1A leading up to the state championship.

Coach Marv Cook took over the program in 2007, and since then he's put up a record of 134-12. That's basically a 12-1 record every year for 11 years, which is insane. Obviously, for Xavier's RPI concerns, Regina will be a big plus, regardless of the outcome of the game on August 24.

Xavier is 3-1 all time against the Regals. Drew Cook took over the game at Saints Field back in 2014 to lead Regina to an exciting 21-7 win, a game that was tied 7-all with less than 10 minutes to play; the Saints responded in 2015 with probably the most thrilling comeback ever in Xavier history. An interception in the end zone with about a minute left in a tie game led to a quick drive downfield, then a 35-yard field goal from Dallas Klein as time expired for the 38-35 victory. The Saints then won 35-26 in 2016 and 23-6 last season, never trailing in either game.

For 2018, Coach Cook faces quite a challenge after graduation sapped the squad of 2,008 yards rushing and 1,884 yards passing, as well as 7 of the team's top 8 tacklers. Ashton Cook looks like the frontrunner for quarterback after throwing for 640 yards as a freshman last year. Nick Milder and Kieler Brown combined for 282 yards rushing, while Alec Wick and Patrick Clark caught 56 passes between them. We've seen Regina reload again and again over the years, and I wouldn't expect any less from Coach Cook and his team this year - but there's also no doubt that numbers continue to shrink (not only for Regina, but for football teams across the state), and maintaining the standard of excellence we've seen for the past 11 years is going to truly be a challenge this season.