Ray Hamill/HumboldtSports.com – St. Bernard’s Justin Hagler

By Ray Hamill — The annual Milk Can showdown in Fortuna on Friday night is the highlight showdown on tap for local high school football this weekend.

But it’s not the only game in town, nor the only one for local fans to get excited about.

A total of seven of the nine local teams will be in action, including the Huskies and Ferndale Wildcats in Fortuna, as well as the Arcata Tigers, who host Willits in the Redwood Bowl on Saturday afternoon.

The Eureka Loggers hit the road for the second straight weekend to play at Montgomery, while both Del Norte and St. Bernard’s will try to keep their unbeaten starts to the season going on the road at Petaluma and La Salle, respectively.

And rounding out a busy weekend of action, the McKinleyville Panthers will try to build on last weekend’s big win over Fort Bragg when they travel to play at Lower Lake under the Friday night lights.

For more on Eureka’s game at Montgomery, see Loggers playing competitive football despite winless start …

For more on the Milk Can game, see More than pride on the line in Milk Can …

Friday

St. Bernard’s (3-0) at La Salle (0-1), 7 p.m.

SB head coach Matt Tomlin isn’t reading much into La Salle’s big loss in Crescent City last week, and expects a far better performance from a Falcons team that was playing its first game of the season against a very good Del Norte squad.

“I expect La Salle to be a lot better,” he said after his team arrived in Portland for the game on Thursday afternoon. “They’re really big, a lot bigger than us. They have a bunch of linemen 280 or 300 pounds.”

The Falcons are coming off a 42-7 loss against the Warriors.

“We’ve got to be physical,” Tomlin said. “We’re going to have to match their intensity at the line of scrimmage.”

The Falcons will also go a lot deeper with a roster of 71 players.

The Crusaders, however, won’t go in lacking in confidence after a dynamic start to the season on both sides of the ball, with numerous playmakers stepping up early.

Last week, St. Bernard’s defeated Arcata 49-8.

Del Norte (3-0) at Petaluma (1-2), 7 p.m.

The Warriors will head to Petaluma looking for their fourth win in four games.

They’ll also be looking to cut down on some of their penalties.

Indeed, there’s little to fault about Del Norte’s impressive start to the campaign, with a small roster setting a physical tone at the line of scrimmage and a core group of playmakers taking full advantage of their opportunities.

If there is one complaint early, however, it has been the number of penalties.

“We get first-half penalties and I don’t know why,” Del Norte head coach Nick White said. “But in the second half we don’t get penalties, and I don’t know if it’s the officials adjusting to how physical we are.”

The Trojans will present a different challenge for the high-flying Warriors.

“They run the triple option offense, so it will be the first time we face a team trying to run the ball on us for the most part,” White said. 

That means the Warriors will need to make sure they cover their assignments.

McKinleyville (1-2) at Lower Lake, 7:30 p.m.

The Panthers posted a breakthrough win last week. The question now is what they can do for an encore?

Lower Lake is also coming off a first win a week ago after dropping its opener the previous weekend.

“We’re both trying to get that second win,” Mack head coach Keoki Burbank said. “So we’re both in the same boat.”

Through their opening three games, the Panthers have certainly shown more balance than last year, including a much improved passing game and three backs who can put up yards on the ground.

More importantly, last week’s performance along the defensive line showed a lot of promise, although Burbank is hoping to refine that a little.

“I think defensively we have to tackle well, and I think we have to pressure the quarterback,” the head coach said. “We did a good job of pressuring the quarterback last week, but we only had one sack.” 

Overall, Burbank has seen plenty of improvement from his team in 2019, and appears to have added depth at his disposal.

“We have to keep doing the little things correct, but once we do the little things right our offense gets going,” he said. “We have multiple guys that can do things with the football.”

Saturday

Willits (2-0) at Arcata (0-2), at HSU, 1 p.m.

The Arcata Tigers are still searching for their first win after two tough opening matchups, and they will try to get it when they host Willits at the Redwood Bowl on Saturday.

The Wolverines will be far from a pushover, however, with a record of 2-0, including a 20-0 win over McKinleyville two weeks ago.

“They’re pretty solid,” Arcata head coach Jamal Jones said of the Wolverines. “They’re undefeated, they’re 2-0, so they’ve done some good things.”
In particular running back Jacob Arms, who was a handful for the Panthers.

“We’ve got to be ready,” Jones said. “(Arms) is a hell of a player, so we’ve got to stop him and force somebody else to beat us.”

Stopping Arms will be a key on the defensive side of the ball, while scoring points will be key on offense.

Last week the Tigers managed just eight points against St. Bernard’s and were shut out in the second half.

“We’ve got to score, that’s the No. 1 thing,” Jones said. “You’ve got to score in football, and that’s been the emphasis all week.

“We’ve been moving the ball, but we’ve got to get it in the end zone.”