Northern Colorado is a hot bed for high school football. From perennial powerhouses like Loveland, Roosevelt, Windsor, Eaton, and Platte Valley to the newcomers that seem to be battling each year like Resurrection Christian and even Highland. There always seems to be a favorite, but not this year.
Loveland is still a wild card. After a tough loss to Broomfield in the opening week of the season, they bounced back with a huge win against Thompson Valley by a score of 41-12. After falling to number 7 in the rankings, Loveland may not be the formidable squad from last year, but they are sure to rack up the wins again this season. The Roosevelt Roughriders remained neutral last week with a bye week, but as mentioned in previous blogs they are a question mark. The Wizards won their opener after a weather delay changed not only the day, but the location of the game as well. After the big win, they hosted number 8 Ponderosa. The game was back and forth and with a late game touchdown Windsor cut the lead down to one making the score 24-23 Ponderosa. Chris Jones elected to go for two and was not successful. In perhaps the most thrilling game of the week Windsor fell by a point.
The 2a classification is crazy. In consecutive weeks, the number one team in the state fell. Platte Valley, Eaton, Sterling, and University all won with relative ease. The stand out was Shalla from Sterling with 6 total touchdowns and the Tigers are 3-0 for the first time since 2006. Resurrection Christian was idle this week, but when you look at this field, it is wide open.
Perhaps the most improved team in Northern Colorado is the Northridge football team. After suffering a 6 point loss to Hinkley in the opening week, the Grizz bounced back in a big way. They defeated the Greeley Central Wildcats 26-13 snapping a losing streak against the Cats. Jeremy Hayden is quickly putting his team on the map among Greeley Central and Greeley West, who also had a big win over George Washington on Friday.
High School football in Northern Colorado is very good, even with the question marks surrounding some teams, my guess is that at least a couple of these teams will turn early season adversity to late season wins.
