WOW Again -- Friday Night Lights Part IV -- Jaguars Football Team Jazzes Up Homecoming Week With 28-7 Whipping of the Maple Lake Irish

Following the game, this father-to-son exchange went something like this, "Son, why didn't you make that catch? You had open field to the endzone!"

JAGUARS PICK UP 6TH HOMECOMING WIN IN B-B-E HISTORY, first since 2005.

I'm not sure if Maple Lake saw this one coming, but the Irish left town battered and bruised after taking a 28-7 thrashing from the Jaguars football team on our Homecoming night. The Irish were coming off an impressive 45-0 pummeling of Kimball Area on the Cubs' Homecoming game last week.

Photos will be added tonight, and I will start the process of uploading almost 200 photos from the football game to the Sauk Herald photo gallery. URL = http://saukherald.mycapture.com

**The reason I was completely psyched out of my mind as the end of the game got closer, and it appeared that we were on our way to a win over the Irish tonight...is that Homecoming football wins at B-B-E are RARE. How rare? Well, while the last win for Homecoming was not too long ago...a 39-26 win over Kimball Area in 2005 in which Jordan Weller totaled a school-record 505 all-purpose yards... prior to that the Jaguars had won only four Homecoming football games since the 1988 pairing. Talk about miserable for hometown fans.

I actually mistakenly told the football team and coaches in the post-game huddle that this was our 8th win in school history for Homecoming.

I was wrong.

Here is the list of the years in which we won a football game on Homecoming night: 1988, 1993, 1994, 2003, 2005. **This was only the 6th Homecoming football win in school history, out of 21 seasons! Even in 1997, when the Jaguars went 5-3 and almost made the Class AA state tournament, they hosted a powerful Morris Area team for Homecoming and lost 40-18.

Against Maple Lake, the Jaguars totaled 305 yards of offense. They won the turnover battle by a 4-3 margin, although one of the interceptions was meaningless at the end of the first half. Winning the turnover battle is key to winning football games, as if you're on the wrong end of that formula in the Central Minnesota Conference you will pay for it.

They've now had 2 straight games with no lost fumbles. It's only one detail in the big picture of developing a winning team, but it's progress and I'll take it!

Good grief...I just heard that Eden Valley-Watkins blanked Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted 35-0 in Eden Valley tonight. The Eagles appear unstoppable at this point. They earned four interceptions against the Lakers tonight. The Lakers' quarterback was 6-of-24 in passing!

Pierz tagged Rockford with another loss, beating the Rockets 28-6 in Rockford. The Pioneers coughed up four lost fumbles, while the Rockets threw five interceptions!

The Jaguars travel to Pierz next Friday for the Pioneers Homecoming. The Jaguars' last trip to Pierz was also for their Homecoming, on September 22, 2006. In that game, the Jaguars were driving downfield in the 4th quarter, trailing by 2 scores, but ended up losing 34-12. They were smoked by Pierz in 2005 at home 64-0.

Holdingford defeated Kimball Area in a home game 20-8, most likely sending the Cubs on their way to their first 0-8 season since 2005. The Cubs scored first for an 8-0 lead, but it was all Huskers from there, as their sophomore quarterback went 12-of-22 in passing for 216 yards and 2 TD's.

Other area games...
New London-Spicer took a tough loss at Albany tonight by an 8-7 margin. (Ouch!)
Willmar won their homecoming over a down-on-their-luck Little Falls team 40-0.
Sauk Centre is 0-4 after losing to Mora 39-10. (Ouch!)
Melrose lost at home to Milaca 49-7, also falling to 0-4.
Paynesville Area whooped up on Long Prairie-Grey Eagle at home 41-12.
Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City 54, Minnewaska Area 7
BOLD 38, Benson 8
Browerville 26, Osakis 6


Number-one Class A-ranked Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg beat a bad, winless Parkers Prairie team 55-14 tonight on the road. The Parkers Prairie volleyball team is 11-0, while their football team is 0-4. The Fighting Saints, meanwhile, have yet to play a quality opponent.

-Section 5A team member scores:
Minneota 41, Canby 0
Dawson-Boyd 34, Fulda 7
Renville County West 36, Mt. Lake/Butterfield-Odin 6
Russel-Tyler-Ruthton 30, Murray County Central 16
Adrian 27, Ortonville 0

As the second half of the regular season is about to begin...I will now unveil the Section 5A standings, after four weeks of play. With their 2-2 record, the Jaguars are also in the middle of the pack of the Section 5A teams. A win next Friday over Pierz would send a big statement to the rest of the section, especially No.1-ranked K-M-S, that our Jaguars are for real and they mean business.

1 - (24 points) K-M-S (4-0)
2 - (24 points) Minneota (4-0)
3 - (18 points) Dawson-Boyd (3-1)
4 - (18 points) Renville County West (3-1)
5 - (18 points) Lakeview (3-1)
6 - (17 points) B-B-E (2-2)
7 - (6 points) Ortonville (1-3)
8 - (6 points) R-T-R (1-3)
9 - (Zero) Canby winless

I will point out that, halfway through the regular season, it appears that Section 5A has numerous quality teams. The top four all look very, very good. We need to hope for more losses to be added to the record of Dawson-Boyd, Minneota, and RCW over the final four weeks. At the same time, the Jaguars need to go at least 2-2 if not 3-1 over the final four weeks in order to secure a first-round home playoff game. Section 5A has considerably stronger teams in 2008 than it had in 2006. That year, the Jaguars finished 2-6 but were seeded #4 based on their strength-of-schedule, and the bottom half of the section had some pretty bad teams. This year, 2-6 for the Jaguars would put them probably at #6 for the playoffs. (Not acceptable) They need to build off of tonight's win and earn at least 2 more before playoffs begin in late October.

While I'm at it, I might as well throw out the regular season records for the Jaguars dating back to 1988...this will point out how non-special 2-6 is, and why a 4-4 or 5-3 regular season record would be so special for B-B-E. The following is regular season records in parentheses, not counting playoffs, with playoff info added after the regular season record.

1988 (7-1) 1-1 playoffs, second-round loss to Morris in Class B
1989 (1-7)
1990 (2-6)
1991 (0-8)
1992 (2-6) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Browerville
1993 (4-4) 1-1 playoffs, second-round loss to Osakis
1994 (1-7)
1995 (0-8)
1996 (0-8)
1997 (5-3) 2-1 playoffs, Section 5AA loss to Eden Valley-Watkins
1998 (0-8)
1999 (0-8)
2000 (2-6) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to A-C-GC
2001 (0-8) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Osakis
2002 (2-6) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Dawson-Boyd
2003 (2-6) 1-1 playoffs, second-round loss to Wabasso
2004 (0-8) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Upsala-Swanville Area
2005 (2-6) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Wabasso
2006 (2-6) 1-1 playoffs, second-round loss to K-M-S
2007 (2-6) 0-1 playoffs, first-round loss to Minneota
2008 (???) playoffs???... to be written in October...or November?

Last week's win over Rockford helped mark one noteworthy turning point for the Jaguars football program. Since the pairing in 1988, every four years had at least one winless football team. If you look at my list, you'll also notice that twice a winless season was followed by another winless season (1995, 1996...1998, 1999) Losing tends to bring more losing. The 1991 season was a shock to football fans at B-B-E, when the Jaguars had their first winless team. They totaled 8 wins over the next 3 years, though, including one in playoffs in 1993. Then a bad stretch came from 1995-1996 when they went a combined 0-17. The year 1997 was special, when the Jaguars actually came awfully close to a state tournament berth (in Class AA no less!). Then...two more winless seasons. And then winless in 2001 and 2004.

I'm still not ready to say we've turned the corner in football. I said it in my football story for last week's local newspapers, and I'll say it again, two wins in the regular season is nothing special. We've done it 8 times since 1988, and 6 times this decade. All three of Coach Richards' first teams since he took over in 2005 have gone 2-6 before playoffs. I'll also add, if we finish 3-5 it will be a huge disappointment, with the talent we have on this team. Going 2-6 or 3-5 before playoffs will not impress me.

That being said, tonight was one step in the right direction, on top of the good things that took place in the Rockford game last week. Our first two games of the year...What about 'em? I forgot...they're history, we've moved on.

We certainly can turn the corner with football, and we have the athletes to do it. It now comes down to a matter of execution and keeping the guys excited about the sport. No longer can we say "Oh we don't have the numbers or the players to compete"... that's NONSENSE after seeing what we've done to the Rockford and Maple Lake, both larger schools. I better not hear any more of that talk, or I just might get mad.

Keep in mind, winning brings more winning. The B-B-E community needs to rally behind our football team and give them the support and fan base they deserve as they make winless seasons a distant, faded memory.

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