Photos by Ray Hamill/HumboldtSports.com -The Tigers open the Little 4 at home to Ferndale on Friday night.

By Ray Hamill — Get ready for six weeks of excitement on the local high school football fields, with both the Big 4 and Little 4 kicking off this weekend and running until November 6.

Six weeks of all-local matchups, with four games on tap each weekend and eight teams battling for a pair of conference championships as well as the all-important North Coast Section seedings.

The race for the Big 4 should be particularly intriguing this season, with all four teams grouped together in Division 5 of the NCS and the conference champion guaranteed a very high seed for the postseason.

Heading into the weekend action, the Del Norte Warriors (2-1) are the highest ranked of the four conference rivals on MaxPreps, sitting at No. 3 in their division, behind No. 2 DeAnza and a very good San Marin team (4-0) at No. 1.

But there’s little separating any of the Big 4 teams, at least not in the rankings, with No. 4 Eureka (1-2), No. 5 St. Bernard’s (2-2) and No. 6 Fortuna (3-1) right on the Warriors’ heels.

If the rankings are any indication, it should indeed be a tight race.

“Honestly, I think it’s wide open,” Del Norte head coach Nick White said. “I guess you could say Eureka is the favorite since they won it last year and have their kids back, but St. Bernard’s is way better than last year, and we’re way better than last year, and Fortuna always gives everybody their best shot, that’s for sure. It’s definitely going to be competitive.”

All four teams have some flaws, but each also has a big upside and should continue to improve week by week between now and the playoffs.

That, coupled with some of the best coaches in North Coast sports, should pave the way for another fun season.

The Warriors look like they could be the team to beat, having established their trademark physicality over the past two games, both of which they won.

But the Loggers should be right in contention too, despite kicking off league play fresh off back-to-back losses at Shasta and Windsor.

The Loggers didn’t execute well against a very good Windsor team last weekend, but a young roster should learn from that and you can expect them to play all the harder this week because of it.

That might not be good news for the Huskies, who play Eureka on Friday night, although Fortuna is coming off a lopsided loss too and will be just as eager for redemption.

The Crusaders, meanwhile, open at home to Del Norte on Saturday afternoon, and will also be looking for a measure of redemption after a lopsided loss to the Warriors in their spring finale.

Both Del Norte and St. Bernard’s are vastly improved from that game and both have impressed through the pre-conference schedule.

The Crusaders will be just as dangerous as any of the other Big 4 teams on any given night, but with a smaller roster than their larger school conference opponents they’ll have to stay healthy to compete for a championship.

“I don’t think there’s really a favorite,” Fortuna head coach Mike Benbow said. “Everybody possess problems for everybody else, and we all know each other so well.”

Are the Tigers the team to beat in the Little 4?

The Little 4, meanwhile, should be just as intriguing, although it remains to be seen if it will be as competitive.

The action gets under way on Friday night with Ferndale (0-3) traveling to play Arcata (2-2) and Hoopa (1-1) hosting McKinleyville (3-1).

The Tigers are the highest ranked of the four schools on MaxPreps, sitting at No. 56 in the NCS, eight spots ahead of Mack.

The Tigers are also No. 3 among Division-6 schools, with the Panthers ranked No. 5 in Division 7, followed by No. 8 Ferndale and No. 10 Hoopa.

The Panthers are off to their best start in years under new head coach Fel Barlow and will carry plenty of momentum and confidence into conference play.

But will a young Mack team have enough experience to get the better of a senior-heavy Arcata team that is also growing in confidence each week?

Those two games will be won in the trenches, one way or the other.

The Warriors, meanwhile, have played just two games this season and it’s difficult to know just what to expect from them in the Little 4, although I suspect we’ll know a lot more after Friday’s game against the Panthers.

The Cats, on the other hand, are down this year, with injuries taking their toll and several talented seniors from last year’s team now graduated.

But Ferndale always plays with a lot of pride and won’t back down from the challenge.

“Like I told the players, it’s a whole different season now,” Barlow said.

All in all, it should be a fun few weeks here on the North Coast.