Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] The 2025 high school football season is now just a week away and excitement is building in the hdnl. Hello and welcome to this week's KMUD News Sports Report. I'm Ray hamill with humboldt sports.com we'll have more on the upcoming football season and what local fans can expect in just a moment as we take a look at all of the latest big local sports stories, including why this weekend will be an important one for the HDNL football teams, some College of the Redwoods football news, which local standout is returning to the coast, and news of some coaching changes at South Fork. But first up, the new local high school football season is now just a week away and seven of the nine HTNL programs will be in action on opening weekend, including a pair of all local showdowns here on the north coast. Two of the nine local high school programs also will feature new head coaches this fall. At McKinleyville, Jason Benge has taken over from Fell Barlow while at South Fork, former Del Norte baseball coach Brandon Coburn is back in the HTNL and will take over the Cubs football program from longtime coach Carl Terrell, who stepped down after the 2024 season. Benge will debut with the Panthers when they open the season at home against Fort Bragg on Friday, August 29th. Also in action on the opening weekend of the season, the Fortuna Huskies will travel to play St Helena, the Saint Bernards Crusaders will host Clear Lake and Hoopa will travel to Crescent City to play north in an all warriors showdown. Rounding out a busy opening weekend, reigning state champs Arcata will open against the Eureka Loggers. The Ferndale Wildcats and South Fork Cubs will have a bye on opening weekend, with the Cats set to open their campaign the following week at Fort Bragg and the Cubs scheduled to kick off the new season against Hayfork on September 19th. Conference play for the Big Four and Little Four will begin in early October and will run for six weeks each with home and away format for both, the Del Norte warriors will be considered favorites once again for the Big Four after clinching five straight conference championships, including four outright last season, they won the league with a thrilling 3332 win at Saint Bernards on the final week of the regular season.
[00:02:23] However, despite a very productive off season for the program, they will have their hands full trying to make it six straight conference titles with all four Big Four teams poised to challenge this fall. After struggling in the Big Four for a few years, the Eureka Loggers turned the corner in 2024 and re established themselves as a contender under first year head coach Sam Edmonds. The Loggers are confident they can continue to build program momentum this year and perhaps challenge for the conference crown. Likewise with St. Bernards and Fortuna, who shared the league title with Del Norte two years ago. Both of those programs are always well coached, with St Bernard's Matt Tomlin and Fortuna's Mike Benbow respected of the very best head coaches in the entire north coast section. The Little Four should be every bit as competitive this year. Last year the conference championship was shared by both Arcata and Ferndale, each of whom would go on to make some noise in the playoffs. The Wildcats handed the Tigers their only loss of the season at Ferndale on the final day of the regular season before barely falling to eventual state champion Moreau Catolick in their NCS final. The Tigers would bounce back from their conference ending loss at Ferndale, winning five straight games on the way to the program's first ever state title. Remarkably, Arcata's state win was the fifth for HTNL football in a decade following the success of Saint Bernards in 2015 and 2019, Fortuna in 2017 and Ferndale in 2023. While Arcata lost several key players from last year's team to graduation, senior quarterback Luke Lemke is back and looks set to close out his high school career with a bang. Ferndale returns several key starters including quarterback Tanner Pigeon and lineman Ethan Weitzel, each of whom enjoyed an MVP caliber season in 2024. The McKill Evil Panthers and Hoopa warriors will also be hoping to make some noise in this year's Little Four. The Panthers are coming off back to back winless campaigns in 2023 and 24, but Benge has a large roster available this fall and is hoping the program can turn the corner while the warriors key seniors back to lead the way. The Sound Fork Cubs, meanwhile, will play eight person football once again this fall as they look to challenge the best small school programs in the ncs. This weekend will be a big one for most of the local teams in their preparation for the upcoming campaign, with seven of the HDNL squads heading to Mckinleyville on Saturday for the annual league preseason JV and Varsity Jamboree. The JVS get the day's Action started at 10:00am followed by the varsity teams at 12:30pm Arcata, Del Norte, Eureka, Ferndale, Fortuna, Hoopa and Saint Bernards will be there. Entry fee for fans is $5 for adults and $3 for students and seniors. The College of the Redwoods football team is also busy preparing for the upcoming college season, which also kicks off on the weekend of August 30th. Redwoods is making the jump from the American Division to the more competitive national division this fall, which means a more challenging schedule in store for the team while also opening the of competing for a state championship. CR opens the new season at home against Sacramento city College on August 30th with the game set for 1pm at Cal Poly Humboldt's Redwood Bowl. In local basketball news, new Cal Poly Humboldt men's head coach D.J. broome, who took over the program in June, announced last week that former Big 5 MVP Brandon Bento Jackson will rejoin the team. Bento Jackson played for the Jacks right out of high school two years ago before transferring to San Diego City College last year. The standout guard appeared in 27 games down south and averaged 7.9 points, 3.4 rebounds and 2.4 assists. And rounding out this week's sports report, there are some coaching changes in the air at South Fork High School as we get set for a busy fall schedule. In addition to Cockburn taking over the Cubs football team, longtime girls soccer coach Anne Constantino has stepped down as head coach and will be replaced by Anderson Taylor. Morrow also has left South Fork after a very successful few years in charge of the school's boys basketball team, including winning back to back conference championships. No official word yet on who will replace Morrow, and that's this week's KMUD News Sports Report. Until next time, I'm Ray Hamill with humble sports dot com.
