Northwest 48, Fox 20
There’s still smoke wafting off the field in Cedar Hill this morning – and we’re not talking about any Homecoming fireworks that were set off. There was no need for “Star Spangled Banner with Report” at the Northwest-Fox contest, just quarterback Cohenn Stark reporting for duty. The Varsity Lions ignited all of their fireworks on the field from 7 to 9 PM.
Stark and the Lions were phenomenal in last night’s blowout win over the Fox Warriors, claiming a watershed victory that marks a new era of pigskin at Northwest High School. We are officially in a time of resurgence for a program that hasn’t lorded over Jefferson County since the early 1980s, and if quarterback is football’s most important position, Northwest is the team to watch this fall. It’s certainly hard to take your eyes off Cohenn. The 5’11” swashbuckler found senior WR Omarion Frazier on four passes for a cool 74 yards while running so effectively that he dwarfed all other performances with160 yards and several TDs, including a ragged-but-unstoppable 25-yard jaunt that put NHS ahead 20-7.
This is Jefferson County’s golden age of QBs. Stark’s coup over QB Chandler Price and the Fox Warriors could be a golden ticket to D1 scholarship offers. Like Alabama playing against Cam Newton, Fox’s big, fast defense knew right where Stark was headed but they had no chance to tackle him. On one second-quarter play in plus-territory, the Lions cleared out their backfield while Stark took a Shotgun snap. The Geek pointed at the screen and said “He plants one foot sideways and goes for another 15 yards.” Sho ’nuff, the Warriors watched #5 gallop for another first down before handing off to Drew Spratt, Northwest High’s other Homecoming hero, for an eight-yard TD and a 27-7 advantage.
We’ve teased NHS coach Scott Gerling for spooning such small amounts of praise on the Lions’ star signal-caller. Gerling actually gushed about Stark in last night’s postgame, as any sane HC would have after scoring a Suburban League win for the ages. But that’s not the half of it. Northwest’s 28-point win was also a statement victory for Gerling’s oft-criticized coaching staff, which was GREAT at the end of the first half, out-Fox-ing Brent Tinker’s decision making and turning a potential corker into a laughable final score.
Fox got Cam Newton-ed by Stark’s running in the first 20:00, so the veteran Warriors fought back with what appeared to be perfect offense and clock management in the first half’s waning moments. Price piloted a slow drive for a touchdown that melted away all but :33 of Game Clock in the half. That’s when Gerling’s staff went for the boom-shakalaka.
Gerling anticipated a squib kick after the TD from Arnold that made the score 27-14. After all, Fox was going by the book 100% while trying to engineer a methodical comeback. In a brilliant move, Stark was sent out with the NHS kick return unit – not in “KR” position but as one of the up-backs in a “Hands Team” spot at the 40-yard line. Stark got his “hands” on the ball alright, catching the squib and dashing 60 yards past Fox’s shocked coverage team for another TD. Little did viewers know that the first half’s scoring still hadn’t concluded.
Fox’s kids were demoralized, knowing that all their hard work of the last 5:00 had been erased by Stark’s smart and spectacular six points. That’s when Spratt grabbed a Fox fumble on the last play of the half and rumbled for an unexpected 30-yard TD of his own. Northwest took a 42-14 lead into the break as NHS’s cheers echoed all the way down Big River.
Northwest looked poised to T…T…Turbo Clock the Fox Warriors (!) when Stark took a dagger of a 32-yard run to the house in Quarter 3. It was not to be, as the Lions bobbled the extra-point snap and fell short of a conversion prior to Fox’s mop-up touchdown in the 4th quarter. Good lordy, the Lions were playing their JV against Fox by the end of it!
The Varsity Lions’ statement in Week 6 does more than pound the local Large Schools race into dramatic new shape. It shows that Northwest has gotten way better at football since falling to Seckman 49-14 just three weeks ago. A playoff rematch with Seckman appears to be on the horizon, which would give Cedar Hill a chance to gauge its progression in an even simpler way. But the Lions just dusted a team that lost to the Jaguars in OT. Fox has questions to answer – Northwest knows its Stark-Spratt-Frazier combo is the answer.
Credit to the Northwest Lions’ defense for improving so quickly that the Fox-Seckman “tier” of the Suburban League is now a Fox-Seckman-Northwest tier. It sure didn’t look that way after a 49-14 loss in The Valley, but Gerling’s team has left absolutely no doubt that they’ll fare better against Seckman in November should they get another crack at SHS.
Photo Credit: NHS Facebook
Hillsboro 41, Windsor 12
First things first – congrats to the Windsor Owls for their best outcome against Hillsboro or Festus in a long, long while. Windsor took five consecutive Turbo Clock losses on the chin from the MRAC’s top two in a streak that lasted since September of 2022. The Blackbirds scored 12 points on QB Jett Black runs and passes against HHS’s first string in Half #1. Windsor finished the scrum with 250+ rushing yards, though Black’s five other wayward pass attempts included an interception, and showed how far the Owls still have to go.
Hillsboro’s win was far from a “shaky” performance. The Blue & White was steely and patient while implementing some changes that will help Hillsboro’s 2025 bid going forward. Running a sharper, more aggressive rush offense fits Hillsboro’s talent better now that the Brown brothers are busy in college football. Some of Leon Hall’s offensive linemen look a little bit late to the party, having slow-walked Windsor’s linemen in a number of situations where their teammates were trying to cut quickly up the middle, almost as if they were waiting for an Inside Zone or a Bubble Screen to unfold. But they’ll get there, and the Hawks’ rededication to running the ball could pay big dividends in Weeks 11 and 12.
Grandview 36, Herculaneum 26
We all got more than we bargained for with the Grandview-Herculaneum game, including The Geek who was prepared for less touchdowns, less video, and less information than what wound up blasting across the wires last night. Live Stream STL sent a skeletal crew to Grandview after seemingly picking the game up with less than a week from kickoff (The Gridiron Geek’s been blocked by Live Stream STL on Meta since reporting on its “Heidi Game” incident during the 2020 District Finals, so maybe they had been advertising it sooner) and the Jefferson County Leader ran a terrific live blog of the game with play-by-play recaps and some footage. What spoils! We’ll try to make good use of them.
TGG’s been touting Grandview’s potential on the offensive line for three years. In Week 6, the Birds of Prey showed that their potential on the defensive line is scary too, blocking a punt that was returned by the three-unit standout Isaac Walker for a score and a 7-0 lead early in Quarter 1. The Eagles took a 14-0 lead over the Blackcats into the second quarter, threatening to run away with the scrum when Herky’s quarterback Keaton Reeves was intercepted by another Iron Man star in QB/DB Brendan Martin. But the Dunklin boys clawed their way back into it in tit-for-tat style by picking off a Martin pass soon thereafter, scoring on a Chase Luebbert run and adding a two-point play to make the score 14-8. Reeves responded to another two-touchdown GHS lead when Deets threw a 67-yard bomb to Jefferson County All-Star receiver Tanner Duncan, making it a 22-14 thriller at the half.
Herky overcome several painful penalties to score on a 3rd quarter drive, but the conversion-for-two failed again, and gave Grandview daylight to begin building an insurmountable lead. Walker turned into an unstoppable beast in the second half, shucking off several Blackcats to score from outside the Red Zone and give the Birds of Prey a 29-20 lead with just over 12:00 to go. Quarter 4 was a truly wild finish, however, with the Blackcats threatening to reel off more big plays before getting jinxed by turnovers on two consecutive turns. Wyatt Keim, finally part of a healthier one-two punch in the Grandview backfield, scored an insurance TD to put the Eagles ahead by a stunning score of 36-20. But it was when Cameron Brooks (didn’t he play for DeSoto as a young man?) snagged another INT that both teams – and a crazy-loud Homecoming crowd – knew the Blackcats were cooked.
Talk about an outcome that helps two teams at once! Herculaneum gets credit for turning over a new leaf and tossing the ball successfully from sideline to sideline. That’s the kind of dynamic, balanced offense that Reeves’ resilient group needs to show its capable of, in case a fascinating Week 11 matchup with St. Genevieve or Valle University should happen to come down the pike. For the Grandview Eagles, the victory sets into stone the notions that 2025 is a special season and that a run in the state playoffs could be in sight. The Eagles’ Weeks 7-9 schedule doesn’t seem as intimidating as it once did, given that Jefferson just ran into a wall at Perryville, while the St. Vincent Indians are merely 3-3.
Grandview assistant coach Randal Martin tells The Geek, “Despite the high score, it was actually a good defensive battle.” Maybe that’s true, but after a Week 6 of pregame hype in which The Geek joined in calling for a slow-burn, ball-control contest at Grandview, the Eagles-Blackcats brouhaha reminds us how breathless the action can be when a couple of scrappy Small Schools play for bragging rights. Meanwhile, in the Small Schools vs Large Schools department, Grandview’s showing against Perryville looks better and better.
Photo Credit: Mary Jo Koetting-Nicks
Festus 46, North County 21
North County has its best game of the year against the state #4 Festus Tigers, and yet all the Bonne Terre fan base could do was call into the team’s YouTube headquarters and make poor Jaycee apologize for cussing on the air. (She’s an 18-year-old kid who shows up to volunteer every Friday of each season – do you?) But that’s how it goes when a nightmare season is unfolding. We hope that North County will be able to focus on the positives to some extent after faring so well against Parker Perry’s hungover lineup.
The Geek has a lot of news, notes, and nuggets on the 6-0 Festus Tigers to come, but there’s one such item that can’t wait for next week – we want to put it in as many posts as we can so that there’s no confusion about Black & Gold’s prospects in Week 7. The DeSmet Spartans are not an unbeatable opponent this fall, in fact The Gridiron Geek erred when he reported that DeSmet had defeated Cardinal Ritter to take revenge for its worst defeat of 2024 that preceeded a run to Class 6’s state championship. It was the Jackson Indians who conquered Cardinal Ritter early this season, while DeSmet has slowly-but-surely regressed in the absence of last year’s Division 1 quarterback and other graduates.
DeSmet-Farmington-Jackson looked like a verifiably crushing slate for Festus in the final three weeks of this regular season, what with DeSmet holding the state’s most prestigious crown, Farmington on fire under a new coaching regime, and Jackson remaining the Jackson we know and admire. The way things have worked out, it looks like the Tigers’ last three weeks’ schedule will be a perfect “rehearsal” for the battles to come. How perfect? Holy heck, it’s like the Football Gods set it up as an ideal 12 quarters of preparation.
DeSmet ’25 has played Vianney, the likely Class 4, District 2 champion that District 1’s winner will face in Week 13 (according to this year’s Al-Gore-Rhythm) and the Spartans won that game handily, but by a respectable 49-35 final score. If the FHS Tigers have another good game with DeSmet, they’ll know they can find an edge against Vianney or any of the District 2 teams that the Golden Griffins have already been busy outclassing this year. The Festus-Farmington showdown on Homecoming is anticipated to be a thrill-ride with state postseason intensity, which will also help to prepare the boys for November’s final bracket if they make it that far. Finally, the Jackson Indians will make a pretty OK stand-in for whoever would be left in the Class 4 state bracket if Festus (or Hillsboro) does go on to defeat District 2’s winner in Week 13. Week 9 could feel like a Show-Me Bowl dress rehearsal, assuming that the Tigers keep looking more likely to make another grab at the grail. If it’s Hillsboro, they’ll only get to “rehearse” for the playoffs against PBHS.
Perryville 35, Jefferson 0
Disaster! Perryville whipped Jefferson so soundly that the chatter across JeffCo was that some of the Blue Jays’ top players must be injured. Maybe that’s true in the trenches, but thankfully it wasn’t the case in Perryville. The Blue Jays simply struggled at a stadium where they’ve struggled before, throwing drives away in the Red Zone and giving Perryville’s offense all kinds of daylight for four first-half TD drives. The outcome makes the 4-2 Blue Jays and the 3-3 Pirates look like mystery teams that you just can’t figure out. Jefferson, surprisingly, didn’t fumble the game away, and Cooper Frisk didn’t toss it away either. It was a perfect game for Perryville in which an evenly-matched team got a Mercy Rule win.
St. Pius 70, Cuba 0
Woo! St. Pius X sets what The Geek believes could be a program record for Margin-of-Victory, without having to use a single, solitary “run up the score” tactic to get there. Lancers Evan Eckrich, Cody Shaver, and Cayden “Major” Payne combined for six touchdowns in the opening half to put Cuba behind 42-0 on Homecoming Night. Impressively, the SPX underclass burned the Cigars for 28 more points while helping the Varsity roster pitch Hill Valley’s second shutout, a JV performance similar to HHS’s versus DeSoto in 2022.
Oh, and since Jefferson laid such a humongous egg against Perryville last evening, now there’s this:
As far as The Geek is concerned – and he would say this about any JCAA team in #2 next to #3 St. Pius – Jefferson’s administration is already “on the clock” to answer whether they plan to play, forfeit, demand that St. Pius forfeit, or petition for some weird “neutral site” game to escape the utterly intolerable fate of hosting or visiting the Lancers again, should Week 11’s schedule work out that way. We hope the wonderful kids from both schools can ignore the controversy (and vinegar in the stands) and have a great game anyway.
The Geek’s poem to JCAA teams who’re paired against St. Pius in the playoffs:
The grown-ups pooped on the field, and left sty on it.Â
They have made your bed, and you must lie on it.Â
Pattonville 40, Seckman 27
The Seckman Jaguars didn’t play nearly as well Northwest on Friday, but they sure outshined Fox, one month after having their mastery over Arnold questioned in the aftermath of Week 2’s instant classic. Brody Kube’s offense did what Chandler Price’s lineup couldn’t do, mounting a legit comeback bid after a wide-open team took a 27-6 lead into halftime. Mississippi Magazine has hailed the Pattonville passing game that gave the Pirates their unimpeachable lead with big plays against Seckman’s suddenly shaky secondary. But it was a running play that sealed the deal, RB Larry Martin’s breakaway TD carry early in the fourth quarter that tamped down the Jaguars’ comeback momentum once and for all.
Seckman is too good to have to come back from many 28-7 deficits, but it’s good to know that the Jaguars can do it when they have to. Fox still has to show that it can.
DeSoto 36, Fredericktown 7
DeSoto did not have a perfect game against Fredericktown. We suspect the Dragons were looking forward to the Hillsboro game next weekend, which they deserve to do as the first Joachim Junction team in forever that could beat Hillsboro without having to get lucky. DeSoto defeated Windsor by about the same score that Hillsboro tripped the Owls. Hillsboro’s win against North County is infinitely better than the Dragons’ close-shave loss to the Raiders … but DeSoto’s defense played better against the Festus Tigers.
DeSoto is about to play the #3 ranked team in the county in what should be a good game. Eli Thebeau’s team, however, does not look like a guaranteed winner against Herky in the upcoming JCTV Bowl on October 17th. That’s “Herculaneum,” only the #12 ranked team at Mississippi Magazine until very recently. What more evidence do we need that JeffCo pigskin is rising like never before? Our teams are all pretty darn good, and they could all beat one another on a given night, almost like the movies and TV shows that we know.
Heck, let’s call up Charlie Stegall and get some Hillsboro-vs-Herky action going again soon. The Geek can’t create Fantasy Tournaments for everything.