Spartans lining up for a stellar season in prep football | FALL SPORTS PREVIEW

Published 4:15 pm Friday, September 4, 2015

The Spartans will be spending Friday evening at home this week, the first time the season’s initial football game will be played on their own turf in at least two years.

And, if the team plays as well as they have been in camp and preseason trials, team officials said earlier this week, it should be a triumphant return indeed.

With a roster including 11 key returners as well as nine talented varsity newcomers and seven promising sophomores, this year’s BHS varsity football team is looking to continue the improvement streak begun by last year’s squad, who finished the year 4-6 — a vast improvement over the previous year’s 1-9 tally.

The first inclination of how likely that task will be will become clear at 7 p.m. Friday on the field against the Spartans’ perennial rivals from North Kitsap High.

“It’s nice to have at home because you’ve got your fan base [close],” Spartan Head Coach Andy Grimm said. “It’s just fun to have a good rivalry to start off.

“The kids know each other,” he added of the teams’ relationship. “We did summer Passing League against each other. We also saw them at football camp. We know they’re a talented team, they had a great year last year [with] kids coming back, so we know they’re going to be good.”

Preseason looks are often deceptive, Grimm said, because both squads are usually missing players due to family obligations.

Still, the Spartans were looking good earlier this year.

“We played them at camp [but] I think we were both missing kids because of vacation and stuff,” Grimm said. “We competed with them well at camp. Whether that’s because they had more kids missing? I don’t know. You never can tell.”

The specific opponent doesn’t matter so much this early in the season, the coach explained. The objective now is to implement the skills and plays from practice in a real world situation with all the atmosphere, excitement and pressure that accompany the year’s first game.

“I just know they’re talented and we’ve got to have a strong game plan going in,” he said.

Duking it out for the spot of starting QB, Grimm said, are Jack Frickleton, a senior who played mainly defensive positions last year, and junior Riley Dunn, who took the top spot on the JV squad last year.

Though there has been no official vote, Sam Wysong has been acting as team captain so far this season.

The Spartan squad is shaping up nicely, Grimm added, and the first few weeks of the preseason “flew by.”

“I think across the board it’s a focused group,” the coach said. “I just attribute that to starting with the coaches having things well planned out and [being] very goal-oriented on what they want to get done and the kids just buying into that at practice and working at it and being really efficient.”

BHS has three experienced returners slated for the line on Friday.

“I like the work of our line so far, working with offensive and defensive line,” Grimm said, listing Alex Pickett, Alstofo Rueda and Joe Cibula as the group’s core.

Also Devon Turner, a part-time starter last year, is slated to man the line, which, Grimm explained, puts the Spartans close to “four-fifths” status.

“That’s a good thing to have in football,” he said. “Then, I’ve got two kids fighting out for that tackle spot, that fifth position.”

Jacob Mathisen and Quinton Blevins are the contenders for that final spot.

Grimm listed the top returning varsity players this year as Wysong, Pickett, Sam Roth, Carter Daniels, Rueda, Cibula, Frickleton, Ben McDonald, Eric Jung, Turner and Nick Nordberg. He counted among the team’s key newcomers to varsity Keagan Barnes-Grant, Coltrane Brooks, Adrian Rojas, Nick Fleming, Jacob Chymiy, Dunn, Lucas Weyland, Aidin Carlilse and Matt Reltein.

The team’s most promising sophomores, those who the coaches expect could see varsity playing time this year, include Arman Jaberi, Jacob Hogger, Kyle Bierly, Ethan Pelequin, Blevins, Mathisen and Jackson Almodover.

The teams to beat in the Metro this year are Eastside Catholic and O’Dea, Grimm said. Both schools boast perpetual powerhouse programs, though he admits to only vaguely keeping track of individually top-ranked players in the league.

“I truly don’t pay attention,” he said, choosing to focus on the opposing team as a whole. “I pay attention in the paper, but I can’t quote them to you.”

Football is a sport on the rise on Bainbridge Island, with the high school program boasting more than 65 participants this season — an improved turnout from previous years.

Grimm and the other coaches have been working to foster greater interest and participation in the sport at the youth level, including the founding of such new events as the Spartan Bowl, intended to become a new yearly tradition, which officially kicked off the 2014-2015 playing season and included a punt, pass and kick contest followed by a four-team scrimmage tournament and cookout.

The football festival was originally slated for last month, but was rescheduled for Thanksgiving weekend, Grimm said, to ensure the highest number of alumni would be on the island to participate.