Photos by Ray Hamill/HumboldtSports.com – The Del Norte Warriors

By Ray Hamill — It’s that time of the year again. Time for local football fans to feel optimistic about their team’s chances for the upcoming season.

After all, no team goes into the season opener with a losing record and there’s usually plenty of optimism to go around ahead of the first play of consequence.

And with that in mind, we’re going to take a look at this year’s Big 4 teams and reasons why they should feel optimistic going into another new season.

The new campaign kicks off next Thursday night when St. Bernard’s travels to take on the Warriors in Hoopa.

The other three Big 4 teams will all be in action the following night, including a mouth watering all-local matchup between the Del Norte Warriors and Fortuna Huskies at Husky Field.

This will be a non-conference matchup between these great rivals, who shared the Big 4 championship with St. Bernard’s last fall.

The two schools will meet again in a conference showdown later in the season, but for now the opening game will give us some idea as to what we can expect form them.

And rounding out the opening weekend of games for the Big 4 schools, the Eureka Loggers will begin a new era with a new head coach as they look to put the disappointment of a winless season in 2023 behind them.

The Loggers open at home against the Arcata Tigers, who beat them a year ago in a game that helped set the tone for the season for both teams.

That game will be played at the Redwood Bowl.

Here then is a breakdown of why Big 4 fans should feel optimistic about their team’s chances this fall.

Del Norte Warriors

Well, in simple terms, the Warriors rarely disappoint and we see no reason why that should change this year.

Del Norte has won at least a share of the past four Big 4 championships, including outright titles in 2019, 2021 and 2022.

They were brought back to the pack a little last fall when they lost 22-12 at Fortuna on the final weekend of the regular season, a defeat that ended a 15-game conference winning streak.

However, you can expect the Warriors to be in the mix for another conference championship this fall and perhaps even better than a year ago now that head coach Darren LaFazio is in his second year in charge.

Del Norte has one of the best community youth football programs in the area, while the school’s JVs are consistently among the best in the H-DNL, all of which suggests the Warriors should be every bit as competitive in the near future as they have been in the recent past.

Eureka Loggers

It has been a tough few years for the Loggers, who have struggled to build much momentum since an undefeated shortened campaign in the spring of 2021 and went winless last fall.

However, there is plenty of optimism that new head coach Sam Edmonds and his staff can get this program back on track this fall.

Whether they can challenge for a conference championship remains to be seen, but they should be more competitive after a strong offseason that has re-energized the program.

A schedule that features seven road games, including six straight after the opening weekend, won’t help matters, but if the Loggers can start strong they could build momentum before conference play rolls around in late October.

If the players can’t get fired up for this season, then I’m not sure anything can motivate them.

The Fortuna Huskies

Fortuna Huskies

One year after sharing a conference championship with St. Bernard’s and Del Norte, the Huskies appear ready to win it outright this fall.

Not only do they feature one of the best head coaches in all of H-DNL sports — as well as one of the best coaching staffs in all of the H-DNL — but they also have the reigning co-Defensive MVP of the conference (Jake Houseworth) back, as well as several players moving up from a dominating JV team that won the Big 4 title last fall and was 8-2 overall thanks to a relentless running attack.

The Huskies will be tested right off the bat when they kick off the new campaign against Del Norte, one of three straight home games to start the season before they hit the road for five straight games.

It could be a fun fall at Husky Field and with two of their three conference games at home they should contend for a Big 4 title.

St. Bernard’s Crusaders

Last fall, head coach Matt Tomlin and the Crusaders won a first-ever Big 4 championship, sharing the title with the Huskies and Warriors.

And they did it with a large group of underclassmen at the skill positions.

The big challenge this year for Tomlin and his players will be replacing the 2023 Humboldt Sports Football Player of the Year, Wyatt Simoni, who dominated the rest of the H-DNL on both sides of the ball like few players ever have.

They also must replace an experienced group of linemen, but there is a ton of talent on this roster, including the aforementioned youngsters, who will have benefitted tremendously from the game time they got last fall.

Few programs in the area have been as consistent as the Crusaders over the past decade, so you can expect them to be right in the mix again for a Big 4 title by the time early November rolls around.